RACES IN 2003.

Gisborne Times, Volume IX, Issue 712, 7 January 1903, Page 4

RACES IN 2003.

The clever writer “ Tohimga thus lets his fancy fly : Race day in Auckland at New Year, 2003, A.D.I From earliest dawn the roads for a hundred miles around are covered with speeding vehicles, with great ’buses and brakes, with dainty gigs and sulkies, with stout farm waggons and what-not, all horseless, all motored, all puffing steadily, or gliding swiftly to the score of eminences which make the isthmus beam titul. Where shall we go lo see the races ? To Mount Eden, perhaps, if we come from Heiensville ; to Mount Wellington, perhaps, it we come from the Waikato ; to the slopes of Waitakerei, perhaps, if we are city fiee. Ihe choice of place i = boundless. And as the dawn grows to day, the monorail cars come sweeping in, electricpowered, from the great cities ot the Far North, from the cities of the East Coast, from Wellington, from iuithest Otago, for Cook loti ait is tunnelled, and our railway schemes have more than come to pass. And from sydney and Melbourne, Brisbane and the now nameless Fedeml capital, come a fleet of air-borne shiothat mock in their flight the turbmeo rush of the cheaper tn.fflc by sea. Foi Auckland has made us races tne grea holiday gathering of the ."rouih. Ih> glories ot the Meiboflrne Cup are told only in song and legend. The Auckland Cup goes to the aeronaut who covers the Hundred Mile Circle in the quickest time,

Li the Auckland Shield to the rerunaut who rises highesi, the Auckland Medal to the E rerunaut who comes to earth quickest and steadiest from two miles high. As the ' race time draws nigh the myriad airships *> swoop and hurtle like flocks of swallows e as they clear the great track for the comIJ petitors. u At the drop of the time-ball they are oft, . u the swift couriers of the air, models from “ America and Russia, from Britain and "■ Franee, and eveu from Japan, from the I*. Australian States, and from the famous workshops of Auckland itself. They have g done away with handicaps in 2003, giving the race to the swiftest, as they have learned how always the battle goes to the 0 strong. And the airships fali together on e slanting pinions from Mount Eden, gathere ing way for the speedy upward movement ,j that strains their motors and makes their Li lean frames shake and vibrate. '1 hey rise, j they fall, ever rising higher and higher in ’ the rebound. Suddenly one lags, totters [- in mid-air, a broken wing flies up, and for 0 3000 yards of deadly drop she comes down 1- like a stone—for gas-ships have been x. abandoned ages before. A million pair of hands tighten convulsively, a million 0 mouths di aw gasping breaths, and then a s million throats raise every echo from y Thames to Waitakerei. First one, then :r another, then another—little dots have 0 parted from the falling wreck, follow ■b swiftly downward for a moment, then more slowly, then drift downward gently, carried sideways by the breeze. And dim specks grow into rescuing airships, swoopa ing down like vultures upon the clinging parachutists—and all eyes turn again to 0 tne racers that are 10 miles away in the h two minutes that have passed, From the start they have "begun to , separate, but they are away Thamesward «■ in a bunch, and not until they come back b far north of Rangitoto can the chances of •> victory be seen. It lies between a heavy, powerful French machine, and a lighter l " but more quickly-manoeuvred American, 0 you would think, being a visitor from a 3 ” past cemury, but the New Zealanders of : the day know betier, and go frantic over ’ the most backward ship of all, a homemade champion. It is so far behind that you " would think it had given up the race. It is climbing higher and higher, as though it competed for the Shield and not for the 3 Cup. It is half-hidden to the onlookers in the glare of the midsummer sun. But through strong-shaded glasses you can ■_ still discern the fluttering of its propeilor, and the ceaseless shilling of its pinions as u it climbs and climbs and climbs. Hardly half the great ciicie has been traversed when a hush falls on tne multitude as , suddenly as when the wrecked airship C tottered, but this hush lasts until the great i race is over and won. C The Aucklander is 20 miles and more behind her foremost rivals, but she is ) three good miles higher, and coming down in great switchback curves, that bring her - within a few hundred yards of Mother j Earth. They can outstrip her on the e level, their engines can drive them two i feet to her one, they can outpace her by j sheer weight on the downward plane, but they cannot rise at her sharp angles, they 3 cannot risk the terrific pressure of her • peculiar movements. She has gained her 3 vantage height. Given time, given that 1 her pinions hold and her joints work true, 3 and her steersman makes no error, she • must win. And she has just time. She could give them 25 miles in 50 now and tie them. With only 20 to make up it is sure—if she holds together. Downward she comes 1 Five miles of ' a fall in 15 —and she passes the ruck as though they were standing still, for all ’ their 200 miles and more an hour. Space [ is eaten up before her, and as she nears the ground a million hearts stand still. 1 We see her pinions shifting again—her propeilor is idle now ; its uses over —and then she disappears behind a low hill, and we wait, heart in mouth. Hold now, bolts and rivets! Be stiff, rods and stays ! Be supple, joints I Be calm and crafty, captain ! For six men’s lives hang in the balance. Unless she holds together and answeis, no power on earth can save them now. And from behind the low hill she comes soaring on (lie upward curve of j her flight, hardly slower on ils longer j stretch than in the daring ship-craft of her record swoop. Up and still up she ■ goes in the face of that great impetus. She has left everything behind her, but her two foremost rivals. She has reduced iheir lead to five miles, and will gain ten at least on the next and last slant that will carry her back to Mount Eden. She is again far above them, when she wheels, a faint speck in mid-sky to the unaided eye. Then down again she sweeps, in longer decline this time, but 1 sharp enough to make men fear that she may not hold to the end. The German is left behind in half-flight. For a moment it looks as though the American, caught far up, would venture to imitate her tactics, but he is soon seen to be cor.? tent with second place. So home she comes, victress, in the sight of a million % picnickers, mostly her backers, hough you would hairiiy think so by the number of wonU 1 ' 1 who find xlief in tears for that long drawn five minutes of anxiety. The Auckland Races 1 Well, they may be quite as interesting in 2003, though not run with horses or held af Ellgrslie.