1904: This is the first running of Royal Automobile Club Tourist Trophy, the oldest and craziest road race in the world. The original race features touring automobiles and is won by Clifford Earl, who covers the 255.5 miles in 7 hours and 26 minutes.
Today, we think of the Tourist Trophy race as one of the most insane sporting events on the globe. It's a motorcycle race that takes place on the Isle of Man, a 221 square mile rock between England and Ireland. Motorcycles of all shapes, sizes and configurations race over a 37-mile course made up of everyday public roads at speeds that most people would consider crazy at best, and suicidal if they were trying to be accurate.
The course is laid out on normal roads that are narrow, tight, twisty and in various sections, lined with fence posts, rock walls, stone building, gas stations and the like. An accident, or an "off" as the riders so quaintly put it, often results in a moving eulogy and a very nice headstone. It takes a certain kind of person to try something like race in the TT, as it's more commonly known.
The best of them all was the Irishman Joey Dunlop, who won the TT a staggering 29 times. But other successful TT competitors read like a who's who of bike racing. Names like McGuinness and Hailwood and Agostini and Surtees.
The Isle of Man TT started out more than 100 years ago, in an era where concepts like "safety" and "litigation" had nothing to do with staging a motorcycle race. The amazing thing is that it continues in largely the same spirit to this day. Imagine going to your county supervisors and proposing that you close off the roads running between four or five towns for an entire day, and then letting loose on those roads scores of people who appear to be certifiable maniacs. "Don't worry, we'll have a few ambulances here and there. In case anything happens."
Yet the people of the Isle of Man do this, year in, year out, and find it a most enjoyable pastime. Nowadays it usually takes place in the last week of May or the first week of June, and the atmosphere has been described as carnival-like, with families enjoying picnics and the racing.
So here's to the Isle of Man Tourist Trophy, 105 years of freewheeling craziness.
Source: Various
Photo: Italy’s Valentino Rossi, left, and motorcycling legend Giacomo Agostini ride Yamaha R1 motorcycles during a demonstration lap of the Isle of Man TT circuit Saturday June 6, 2009.
