The Laurel Board Speedway, Maryland, US, staged its first event, a 250 mile race that was won by Peter DePaolo driving a Miller, with an average speed of 126 mph, edging his rival Robert McDonough


Saturday 11th July 1925

The Laurel Board Speedway, Maryland, US, staged its first event, a 250 mile race that was won by Peter DePaolo driving a Miller, with an average speed of 126 mph, edging his rival Robert McDonough. McDonough evened the score by beating DePaolo in a rematch at Laurel Speedway in October of that year. The 50 foot wide track was made entirely of 2×4 boards laid on edge, and banked on the turns at 45 degrees. A sell-out crowd jammed the grandstands for the opening day. The WAshington Post described the new marvel: “A wide board track, wrapping 80 acres of ground as a ribbon might encircle an ostrich egg, with a huge grandstand overlooking it all, is ready today to vibrate under the great motor gruel, the inaugural race at the Washington-Baltimore automobile speedway. Never level and in places almost up and down, it is the arena of sixteen speed-crazed drivers, out on a Roman holiday to entertain the populace and in so doing to lower the world’s speed records.”

Although the Laurel Speedway had a short life — it was only active as an auto track for two years—many of the best drivers of the era raced there. It addition to DePaolo, Indy 500 winner Ralph Keech, Jimmy Gleason, Russell Snowberger and Fred Winnai all competed at Laurel. For a few years after that, it hosted motorcycle and bicycle races, but was eventually abandoned and torn down.


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