Cycling And Motor Notes

Otago Witness, Issue 3101, 20 August 1913, Page 56

Cycling And Motor Notes

BI DEMOS-

Frank Kramer, the American speed king, and A. J. Clark, the Australian sprinter, are furnishing some exciting racing for the American Championship, winch is decided on point's, scored in a series of events during the racing circuit. When the last mail left Kramer had scored 19 points and Clarke 13. Kramer has consistently carried off the American Championship lor nearly a decade.

There is little doubt that no small portion of the credit' of many of the latterday long-distance motor car track and road records is attributable to the great advance made in the detaching and attaching of wire wheels. As an instance of this, during the recent great run of 1070 miles in 14 hours on Brooklands (Eng.) by a 15 h.p. Argyll, the whole four Dunlop detachable wheels were changed in 65 seconds. A few years back this operation would have entailed at least 10 minutes’ hard work.

The English Amateur Athletic Association has been asked by the South African Athletic and Oycling Association to send a team, of athletes to South Africa next winter. The team is to include two racing cyclists, and the N.C.U. will probably be asked to select two of its licensed riders and to give permission for them to make the journey. It is understood that all the expenses of the team, which will probably leave England in October, will bo defrayed by the S.A.A. and ('.A. Another fatality has to be recorded in connection with the preparation and training for the French Grand Pnx Motor Gar Race, which the cables informed us was won bv G. Boillot. The unfortunate ’ was Raul Zuccarelli, the well-known team mate of Boillot and Goux. The accident was tragically simple. The Puegrot drivers, Boillot and Zuccarelli, were out training, when tho last-named, who was travelling at a high speed, collided with a farmer’s cart, driven off a by-road, and hidden by a hedge. The crack French driver was killed on the spot Zuccarelli recently took part' in the 500 Miles International Track Race at Indianapolis (LT.S.A.J, when he had to retire owing to his car catching fire, a petrol pipe having broken.

Mirrors at road crossings, for the purpose of warning motorists, arc commencing to bo used in England, and with satisfactory results. They are being erected in places -where tho crossings are specially dangerous, and tho use of large mirrors allows tho driver to sec the reflection cf curs which are coming in other directions. The method will probably bo extended in tho future, as it is likely to prevent nanny

accidents, and is well worth the email cost of erecting mirrors. Cable advices from New York state that the petrol tank of a motor cycle exploded during a race at Cincinatti. The clothing of a dozen spectators along the track was set on fire by the blazing spirit, threo people being burned to death, and three others seriously injured. Johnson, the rider of the cycle, had his skull crushed when ho ran into a barrier, and was picked up dead. The efficient pedal-aeroplane is not yet within the scope of human ingenuity, if we may judge by the recent trials at Paris. There is, in fact, a comic element about many of the attempts at cycle-flight, and those who expect any scientific development in this direction must be rather disappointed at the levity which seems to surround the French competition. But some of the inventors at least arc in deadly earnest, and certainly France has taken up this subject with much more enthusiasm than has been displayed in other parts of the world. At the last competition for the £4OO offered by a French firm for the first flying bicycle to cover 10 yards in the air there was no lack of effort, for at least 50 machines wore used in the competition, and their riders expended a considerable amount of muscular effort in vain endeavours to make thorn leave the ground. In a few eases one wheel could be raised, and one competitor covered a distance of about three yards with his hack wheel in the air. Kvery type of machine was to be found on the ground—biplane, monoplane, collapsible planes, and no planes at all. One ingenious inventor, struck by the fact that it was impossible, with a big carrying surface, to get up sufficient speed to leave the ground, had the wings of his machine wound up on a roller. While pedalling at a maximum speed, he touched a lever, which caused his roller blind to shoot out in front of him. Unfortunately, it refused to cause the machine to rise in the air, but, instead, landed it, on its head, to the amusement of'the spectators. A Cromwell motor ear owner, Mr W. Bell, put up a very creditable performance on Wednesday week when he ran through from Dunedin to CTormvc’l in seven hours. The car loft Dunedin at 3.50 a.m. (says the Cromwell Argus) and reached Cromwell at 5.30, just on two home being spent in stoppages en route. The run is more creditable in view of the fact that the roads in places wore in bad order.