MASTERLY DRIVINGMELBOURNE TO SYDNEY

Shannon News, 4 January 1928, Page 3

MASTERLY DRIVINGMELBOURNE TO SYDNEY

"THAT RECORD WILL STAND FOR

TWENTY YEARS."

That remark was made to one of Au tralia's greatest racing drivers, Mr'Norman Smith (aptly dubbed "Wizard") in 1924, when the late Mr A. V. Turner broke his (Smith'r) record by driving- from Sydney to Melbourne in 12 hours 34 minutes.

In answer to the remark, which was prompted more "by admiration than by real doubt that the perfect combination of happy circumstances would again enable a driver to got through—Mr Smith made a remarkable phophecy. "By 1927," he said, "the development of motor cars will have progressed to such an extent that the breaking," of this record will be possible with a well-tuned capably handled stock model." This strangely enough has come true —the man and the model have "arrived." In a stock model Hudson Super Six, Mr E. J. Buckley, accompanied by Mr L. Bartlett (known as "Hope" Bartlett on the Maroubra Speedway) covered the 566 miles (Melbourne to Sydney), at the surprisingly high average speed of nearly 50 m.p.h., breaking a record that has withstood all attacks for almost four years. To maintain such a speed on a wide variety of. road surfaces and hazards, and (he record time includes stops for meals and refills of Plume Motor Spirit—the man at the wheel mint be a master driver, with sinews lik e steel springs, and a brain as cool as a mountain stream.

Such a man is Buckley. That he was supremely confident, fearless and without nerves (all psychological essentials in the stuff that record breakers ar e made of) is proved by this incident. "

The first 265 miles having been negotiated in a modest 264 minutes they were ambling along past Breadalbanc between Yass and Goulburn at - 80 m.p.h. On a 'V* corner they hit a gutter dug across since they had passed a day or two before —and hurtled with terrific force through a threerailed fence. The off rear wheel was shattered. It took these two intrepid men but a few minutes to replace the wheel and within 15 minutes of having shaken hands with Death, they were back in their bucket seats hitting SO again.

A striking feature common to the three Melbourne to Sydney records put up by such peers amongst road racing drivers as "Wizard" Smith, the late A. V. Turner and E. J. Buckley, is that they all chose Plume Motor Spirit /while Messrs Smith and Buckley both used M.obiloil. ,

It may be .said by those who con- ( sider that 30 miles an hour is "going some" that such a speed' as this one mentioned here is positively dangerous. To all but few men it would be. To men of the Buckley type driving a car at 80 m.p.h. is much the. sam e as riding a bucking bloodshoteyed demon warrigal to Allan McPhee (Australia's world champion rider of buckjumpers)—something that sends through them the thrill that corner only to men who have attained complete mastery