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  *Comments on Uniontown Speedway:*
  View the most recent comment <#6> | Post a comment <#post>


  1.   RaceFanX posted:
  03.31.2020 - 2:00 pm
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This track was built in 1916 to give motorsports a new home in the area
after the local Summitt Mountain Hill Climb was banned but it would
prove short-lived like all the board tracks. It shuttered for good in
mid-1922 and was demolished afterward. A smaller dirt track nearby
largely replaced it.


  2.   JSPorts posted:
  03.31.2020 - 3:06 pm
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The board tracks seem really unsafe. Also, crazy that they ran 7 AAA
races there in 1918.


  3.   RaceFanX posted:
  03.31.2020 - 3:09 pm
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They really were. They were cheap to build, thus their initial
popularity, but hard to maintain as they weathered.


  4.   possum posted:
  03.31.2020 - 8:30 pm
   Rate this comment:      (1)      (0)

@2 - As RaceFanX said, they were, to drivers and spectators both. Even
when new, with banking at 45 degrees speeds were well beyond what the
tires of the day could handle, and with nothing but a thin wood rail (if
that) on the outside of the turns it was all too easy for a car to leave
the track. Driver and spectator deaths were quite common during the
board track era. And, of course, as the track aged it got worse - the
boards only lasted about 3 years and by the 3rd year holes and loose
wood were common - some cars ran shaker screens, like a dirt car, to
keep flying chunks of wood from puncturing the radiator. (Uniontown must
have been replanked at some point, most board tracks were torn down
after 3 or 4 years rather than spend the money).

They didn't run 7 races in 1918, however: they ran 3. For whatever
reason, the heats for the first event are shown as seperate races. Same
deal in 1919.


  5.   JSPorts posted:
  03.31.2020 - 9:05 pm
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Ah, I see. So the heats didn't count for points at all? I know no points
are listed on them, but I didn't know if that meant they didn't pay
points, or that it's just unknown data.


  6.   possum posted:
  04.01.2020 - 7:32 pm
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@5 - no idea if the heats paid points. But if a track holds 4 heats and
a feature, all on one day, you wouldn't normally view it as 5 seperate
races, you'd view it as 1 event. Take when NASCAR runs Eldora, they run
6 heats and the feature, but we just speak of the Eldora truck race, we
don't say "wow, NASCAR ran 7 races at Eldora in 2019".


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