The Beverly Hills Speedway (also called the Los Angeles Speedway) was a wooden board track for automobile racing in Beverly Hills, California. It was built in 1919 on of land that includes the site of today's Beverly Wilshire Hotel, just outside the "Golden Triangle". The former site is bounded by Wilshire Boulevard, South Beverly Drive, Olympic Boulevard and Lasky Drive. The project was financed by a group of racers and businessmen that called itself the Beverly Hills Speedway Association. The track was the first in the United States to be designed with banked turns incorporating an engineering solution known as a spiral easement.
The Speedway operated for four years and attracted many historically significant competitors including Ralph DePalma, Jimmy Murphy, and Tommy Milton. It was also the site of a racing accident that killed National Champion (posthumous) and Indianapolis 500 winner Gaston Chevrolet in 1920.
Because of rapidly increasing real estate values, the Speedway became an uneconomical use of property. The track was torn down and the Association moved its racing operation a few miles away to Culver City, California in 1924.
History
Wooden board tracks were already established in the United States prior to World War I, and such a track had already been successful in Southern California. The Los Angeles Motordrome in nearby Playa del Rey was the first-ever wooden track purpose-built for motorized competition. The Motordrome created a sensation when it was built in 1910, attracting large crowds of paying spectators for two years before it was destroyed by a fire.
The Speedway Association consisted of eleven members around a nucleus of racer Cliff Durant (son of General Motors' William C. Durant) and William Danziger of the Rodeo Land and Water Company, and included future three-time Indianapolis 500 winner Louis Meyer. The race was attended by 50,000 fans.
In addition to racing, the Speedway hosted other events such as horse shows, and was used as a movie location. The track closed in 1924. By 1928, the Beverly Wilshire hotel was built on the site of the track's north-west turn. The Speedway Association later opened a new track in Culver City, just south of MGM studios.
Races
Statistics for winners of each race.
thumb|[[Bennett Hill at Beverly Hills in 1920]]
{| class="wikitable"
!rowspan=2|Date
!rowspan=2|Driver
!rowspan=2|Distance (miles)<sup>1</sup>
!rowspan=2|Car
!colspan=2|Average speed
|-
!mph
!km/h
|-
|February 28, 1920 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 250 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|March 28, 1920 || Art Klein
|align=right| 50 || Peugeot
|
|-
|March 28, 1920 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 50 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|March 28, 1920 || Tommy Milton
|align=right| 50 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|November 25, 1920<sup>2</sup> ||Roscoe Sarles
|align=right| 250 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|February 27, 1921 || Ralph DePalma
|align=right| 25 || Ballot
|
|-
|February 27, 1921 || Roscoe Sarles
|align=right| 25 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|February 27, 1921 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 25 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|February 27, 1921 || Tommy Milton
|align=right| 25 || Miller
|
|-
|February 27, 1921 || Ralph DePalma
|align=right| 50 || Ballot
|
|-
|April 10, 1921 || Ralph DePalma
|align=right| 25 || Ballot
|
|-
|April 10, 1921 || Eddie Pullen
|align=right| 25 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|April 10, 1921 || Joe Thomas
|align=right| 25 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|April 10, 1921 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 25 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|April 10, 1921 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 50 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|November 24, 1921 || Eddie Hearne
|align=right| 250 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|March 5, 1922 || Tommy Milton
|align=right| 250 || Durant-Miller
|
|-
|April 2, 1922 || Pietro Bordino
|align=right| 25 || Fiat
|
|-
|April 2, 1922 || Tommy Milton
|align=right| 25 || Durant-Miller
|
|-
|April 2, 1922 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 25 || Duesenberg
|
|-
|April 2, 1922 || Frank Elliott
|align=right| 25 || Miller
|
|-
|April 2, 1922 || Tommy Milton
|align=right| 50 || Durant-Miller
|
|-
|December 3, 1922 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 250 || Miller
|
|-
|February 25, 1923 || Jimmy Murphy
|align=right| 250 || Miller
|
|-
|November 29, 1923 || Bennett Hill
|align=right| 250 || Miller
|
|-
|February 24, 1924 || Harlan Fengler
|align=right| 250 || Miller
|
|}
- , and
- Gaston Chevrolet and Eddie O'Donnell collided and crashed into one another during the Thanksgiving Day Beverly Hills Speedway Classic race. Chevrolet and O'Donnell died in the crash, and Lyall Jolls, Chevrolet's riding mechanic, died the next day.
See also
- AAA Contest Board
- American Championship car racing