On the very morning that the New York Times digital edition offered, for sale from its archives, an historic photo of a 1920's motor race, I spotted the above artwork on The GarageBlog. Both images featured vintage racers competing on a board track, which was not unusual then, but the cars in the Times' photo were racing on the roof of a building! Actually, it was the roof of the Fiat factory, an edifice so large that a decent-size oval track could be built up top. Its primary purpose was to provide a testing facility for Fiat cars although the occasional race was staged there. If I'm not mistaken, that same rooftop track was used in The Italian Job, a wonderful rob-and-chase movie featuring a team of Minis.

Much as I'd like to have the Fiat photo hanging on the walls of my den, I'll pass on that one. It's expensive and, well, I don't have a den. In fact the computer desk with its various accessories is located in the bedroom, making my home-to-work commute arguably the world's quickest at 2.5 seconds. It's this wonderful artwork that excites me, not only because of its uniqueness but because the artist has captured the flavour of early racing that old black-and-whites, regardless of how genuine, rarely achieve. Two artists contributed, with Brian Stinger building the Miller Splinter Special out of steel on a high pressure water cutting tool and Dale Smith contributing the wooden track.