Racing: Its utility or otherwise

Progress, Volume IV, Issue 1, 2 November 1908, Page 25

Racing: Its utility or otherwise

On tins subject the Phoenix Motor Company publish their view :—: — In our opinion the whole matter is a qvestiou of national temperament and nothing more, while we aie of the firm opinion that the pe.ih.ap-5 slower but utilitarian views loceivmg effect on this side will bung us farthest in the end, establishing an mdustiy in this countiy prodvong a sound, comfoi table, and useful vehicle that Hill continue to find a ready market the world over long after the craze- for meie speed machines has died its natural death. Racing on the light lines is, undoubtedly goinu. to do a ccitain amount of good 111 the develop ment of any type of vehicle", but it is wrong to take as a guide in a matter of this sort the doings of a nation whose tempeiament in regard to motor competition finds its natuial outlet, in the main, in the racing contest pure and simple Because there is a pieddection across the water for the racer type of voitmette, the French have a certain justification for their many racing events foj the development of then home *naiket, but because it may pay the French it is not going to pay us Speaking generally, the Biitish public and the actual and prospective motoiing public m countries outside do not want the lacing type of two-seatei, but they want the car that will carry two people and luggage comfoi tablv and securely anywhere at an average of 20 mpk They do not want to feel the kick of a big single-cylinder engine — they d-o not want to look through the steering wheel, nor do they want to sit on the floor level. The baby racer to which "H" refers as "an exquisite sporting mount" is all right for the few, but is all wrong for the many, and it is on the demand by the many that the sound motor business is changing demand of the few. With regard to the point as to why we and other English makers of two-seater cars do not suppoit the racing events in question, the answer so far as we are concerned is simply tli at the game, as at present run is not worth th^ candle, while the actual result defeats it'o own end. A special engine and a special car have to be built stich as, are quite unsuitable for our market either heie or abioad, so that directly its race is run it is done with, because each race appears to demand a different car. A man has to spend a month or so on the course, with a very fair chance of the car getting smashed up (see Grand Prix results) before the race comes on. Yet these are minor considerations beside the fact that when it is all done we have only assisted in the development of an abnormal type of car for which m the main there is no demand. Now if "H." will advocate a standard twoseater eai race, the ear for which is chosen at tandom by the promoting body from the

makers stock and sealed all over if they like, that is where we are prepared to come in and do our best in the development of the lightmotor vehicle with one of our standard Phoenix cars. The public would see of what the actual car they buy is capable At present they onh see what a special car on which money has been lavished wholesale, and which is quite different from the car they purchase, can do. Even the High Priests of the present type of racing are asking themselves whethei it is not time to stop We went thiough the 1,250 miles Tour de France (one of the veiy few reliability mils promoted bv the French ) , we have been twice from London to Edinburgh (a distance of nearly 400 miles on a straightaway run averaging 20 m p.h.) ; and have in many other ways demonstrated that which the public require to know concerning the actual vehicle they purchase. No doubt the other cais named with the Phoenix are capable of equally good woik, but it is not by disorganising a factory to build a special team of racing cais, which prove nothing to the public concerning the car they buy, that a really sound business is to be developed, or a national industry maintained.