How Extreme Are You?

Every once in a while, I like to take a slight detour on things and this week is one of them. Now that I'm over a half century old, I can look back on some of my personal automotive history and think to myself that I've done some crazy things in my life. Examples that come to mind quickly are as follows:
 - The time I drove through the 2nd largest city in New England on an early Saturday morning in my 1971 Dodge Charger R/T with a 440 six-pak, to a buddy's garage to fix the front brakes. What made it eventful was the fact it had zero brakes at the time. The fact the car was a 4-speed helped. My loving wife drove in front of me as we crawled down the four lane road with our hazards on doing about 20 mph, until we got to the side street and snaked into the garage where my friend worked on old cars in his spare time. To this day, I'm grateful that the old-style Ford Bronco my wife was driving had the rear bumper prepped with heavy duty foam and several blankets wrapped around it, just in case she had to apply the brakes and I bumped into her; which of course happened. Thankfully, neither we nor the vehicles were any worse for wear. Why didn't we just tow it? Simple - nobody we knew had a trailer, nor a tow vehicle, and the local AAA drivers were clueless about towing an old vehicle. But more honestly to the point, we were just young, way to adventurous, and slightly stupid.

- The 2nd example was the time I installed new u-joints in a 1968 Coronet R/T I had after the Charger. One of those u-joints just didn't feel right, but I test drove it anyway. Of course, I didn't give it a gentle test drive; after all, it was a Hemi 4-speed car. I power shifted into 3rd going up a hill, doing well over 90 mph, when the rear u-joint let go and the driveshaft came up through the floor board. Now I had to explain to my wife about how two u-joints suddenly blossomed into more u-joints, a driveshaft and bodywork... lots of it. And this took place back in the day before the flood of aftermarket parts hit the market by the late '80's and early '90's. Again, I was young, too cocky, and stupid. However, both events were pretty extreme in my book.

Fast forward to last week. I was writing an article for a client about some bizarre automotive sports. Some I was familiar with, others were a new discovery. One of these discoveries was the unofficial sport of Automotive Polo. It followed the same rules as regular polo, except they used cars instead of horses. After viewing several photos for the article, I can honestly say these guys were hardcore. Apparently, the sport was very popular at fairs, exhibitions and sports venues across the United States and several areas in Europe from 1911 until the late 1920s. The man who is credited with being the inventor of auto polo is Ralph "Pappy" Hankinson, a Ford automobile dealer from Topeka who devised the sport as a publicity stunt in 1911 to sell Model T cars. Leave it to a car salesman to come up with such an insane idea. The reported first "game" of auto polo occurred in an alfalfa field in Wichita on July 20, 1912 and was witnessed by over 5,000 people. While there was numerous injuries and broken bones as one can imagine, not just to the players, but sometimes the spectators, there were only one or two deaths during the span of the almost 20 years the sport existed. As you examine the photo above right, groove on the lack of body padding, and totally open cockpit vehicles.

That was then, let's look at now. One motorsport that is still extremely popular, as well as downright hilarious, is extreme Barbie Jeep racing. Whenever I see highlight footage of this stuff, I laugh so hard, my sides hurt. I honestly don't know why. My wife, on the other hand, just shakes her head, and tells me, "This is why as a society we cannot have nice things. Because we're just too stupid." Nevertheless, what most likely makes this sport extreme are two facts; One, is that the drivers gain so much speed, the cars literally fall apart from the drivers weight as well as the bumps. We're talking tires, hoods, and even steering wheels. Face it, Mattel (or whomever) never made these rigs for this type of punishment. Two, is the fact that some drivers wear little else besides a helmet and jeans (which are required). Some of the participants have been doing this gig long enough, (I'm still unsure if that's kinda sad in a way), that they know you can get really banged up if you have a bad spill. Some of these guys literally dress as if they're in a full-on motocross race. And for good reason. Google it if you don't believe me.

I guess it all goes back to that famous phrase, "There's a hobby or sport for everyone." 'Nuff said.

Until nest time, peace out
Dave