Customer Reviews

Cannonball!: World's Greatest Outlaw Road Race

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

One of my favorite memories from many years ago was the day the annual issue of Car & Driver came that covered the infamous Cannonball race. Car & Driver was always my favorite magazine, it started me going in this hobby. I also soon became a subscriber of AutoWeek (in the original "newspaper" format). Motor Trend was pretty much the same mixed bag back then as it is now, and Road & Track was something I hadn't yet fully learned to appreciate.
I wasn't even driving when the Cannonball races started... but they were definitely a bad influence on me later. When I did finally get my license, I took up TSD rallying.. and once I learned to drive them to proper speed and not to a replay of the Cannonball, I did fairly well.

All true automotive enthusiasts know a little something about this legendary race. When friends gather to talk about the greatest things in the car hobby, this is inevitably one of the topics.

If you've never heard of the Cannonball, you've got some reading to do. The Cannonball was a flat-out wide-open road race on public roads - from New York City to Los Angeles. There were no rules, except that you couldn't board a plane! You, and whomever else could fit into the vehicle, had to drive coast-to-coast with only gas and (perhaps, as there are methods to bypass the need for) pit stops! Top competitors completed the drive in 30+ hours in specially prepared cars - cars that had a high top end or where specially prepared in some other way (enormous gas tanks, painted to resemble cop cars, even an ambulance). This was serious stuff, and it was totally illegal.

Brock tells us that the race was originally conceived to make a point against raising government levels of interference, specifically on the highways. But, when the race was first run, as Brock points out in the book, traffic radar was experimental, the insurance companies hadn't yet figured out how to screw you over for infractions outside of your home state, and the highways themselves were fundamentally more isolated and wide open than they are today. Those were the days!

Sadly, as Brock reminds us, there is no possible way you could do something like this today, indeed even the last one was run in 1979 it was entirely clear that an era was over forever. And that's the way I look back at a lot of stuff from the 50s, 60s, and early 70s. Much of it predated me, nearly all of it predated my involvement in this hobby (other than waiting for that great day every month when Car & Driver would arrive in the mail - as I still do). That was a special and unique time, there will never be anything like that again. There won't ever again be an idea as original as a Shelby Cobra, as the original Mustang, or as the Cannonball.

The book itself is an absolute requirement for the library of all automotive enthusiasts. It's a bit rambling at times, but it's also filled with reprints from the best of the Car & Driver articles of that time, along with commentary and stories by Brock that have never been told before. Just as good are the stories of some of the most famous drivers of these events - such as Dan Gurney. Dan tells his story in his own words - and he is as much a classic of that era (one never to be duplicated) as is the race itself. Dan and Brock were co-drivers of a Ferrari Daytona, arguably the most famous of all the cars that competed.

One of the later drivers was Hal Needham, and that was the beginning of the end. If traffic laws and enormously increased police presence didn't kill this era, then Hal Needham's Cannonball Run movies certainly did. This was the end of the road for these events, satirizing them and making them out to be something that was little more than a clown event. To his credit, Hal did co-drive with Brock - in the infamous ambulance with Brock's wife Pam playing the "victim".

If ever there was a reasonably honest depiction of the Cannonball races in film, it was "The Gumball Rally". It's one of my favorite movies. Unfortunately, Brock was on a (thankfully temporary) downhill slide back then and his response to that film was to look into suing it's makers. In the end, he has refused to see it - ever.

The 15 minutes of fame of Brock's movies are long over, but the race itself will always be here. And, this excellent book is the insider story of it.

I just finished reading this wonderful book. It accuratelly displays the happenings of each original Cannonball. You can't get a much better source for what happened than from the creator of the race and the people who raced in it. It doesn't boringly portray the facts, it almost brings the events to life in your head.
I heartily reccommend this book to anybody even remotely interested in automobiles. This is a must-have for any auto enthusiast.

This book is perhaps the most fascinating book I've read since Hunter S. Thompson wrote "Generation of Swine." Only "Et Tu, Babe," by Mark Leyner comes close.

As for Brock's not knowing whether or not there was such a thing as a Monza wagon, I think it's more a matter of him not caring that there was such a thing. The two or possibly three people who still care about the body configurations of Chevrolet's tragic Monza series should seek professional help.

The fact is that the events depicted in this book were not recorded in any systematic way due to the highly illegal nature of said activities. These people were commiting crimes, folks. Thus there is no "Cannonball canon" to use as a reference point. We only have the memories of the people whose stories are told here. I for one am grateful they chose to share those memories in "Cannonball."

My Co-Pilot and I both devoured this highly entertaining book after a "Cannonball" of our own from the east coast out to Chicago. It's a fantastic compilation of Yates' autobiographical musings about the bygone Cannonball era (ie the 1970s) and diaretical essays by many of the actual participants. Fans of the utterly ridiculous movies might be a little disappointed by this more serious treatment of the actual Cannonball Runs, but the book is full of off-the-wall characters and outrageous stories (the Fire-Am, Cop impersonation, and Flying Fathers are among the best).

A must read for any enthusiast who likes road trips and/or driving at more than 65 MPH.

Brock Yates finally tells the real story behind the famous (or infamous, depending on one's POV) Cannonball Races. The reader finds out that although the movies tell some of the story, Yates and many of the participants tell the REAL story behind these illegal races. I fully agree with the picture of Car and Driver's December 1975 issue: The 55 speed limit WAS the dumbest law since Prohibition. It was interesting to see that many of the characters in the movies were based on real people-and you see some of them in the book (guys dressed as priests, the fake ambulance crew, etc., while some had to be left out of the movies for lack of space, it would have been nice to see the guys in the Suburban depicted in the movie, or the doctors in the Jaguar driving with a Igloo ice chest with a pair of pig's eyes in the cooler marked DONOR). A good read about a time when the roads were more open and many had the attitude about the 55 that Yates and company shared. I only wish that it was possible to run a Cannonball today-to quote a participant, Robin Miller (Now with ESPN's RPM2Night) "I'd do it in a New York minute." Now if only I could borrow Mom's new Chevy Tahoe for the race...

I've got a pretty soft spot for the original Cannonballs, AKA "The Erwin G. "Cannon Ball" Baker Sea-To-Shining Sea Memorial Trophy Dash," held in 1971, 1972, 1975 and 1979. After all, local (to me) Hemmings Motor News publisher emeritus Terry Erich and then-editor Dave Brownell, together with Dave Justus, campaigned a 1936 Ford panel truck they called the Red Eye Express (a vehicle that today sits quite innocently just down the street from me in the Hemmings collection) in the final Cannonball. Finishing in 61 hours, 51 minutes, they have the distinction of not only finishing in almost twice the time of the winning Jaguar, but running what I believe is the oldest vehicle ever entered in the original race. That 61+ hours was also the third slowest time ever recorded.

Raised on the Roger Moore/Dom DeLuise movie, I was expecting some sort of madcap retelling of the race, full of Yates' famous rants, "quarantined crazies" and so forth. A sort of Hunter S. Thompson-meets-Vanishing Point, maybe. Alas, what I got was a lot more like a 25th college reunion: A bunch of guys who have, at best, hazy memories of two or three days in their lives a quarter-century ago. Yates assembled as many of the original participants as he could, and each wrote up a couple of pages. The whole thing was then slapped together as a book. It's not that it's bad, but it commits a far greater sin: It's dull. Some of the contributing writers are pretty good, but you usually only get a couple of pages of them before someone interested in gas mileage and average speed comes on. The craziness is there, but it's buried under many years of haze and caution. It should have been written in 1979, when the hum of the interstate and the flash of a smokies lights was still imprinted in their disco-addled brains.

This is a great slice-of-Americana read. Cannonball is especially good because Yates, a master writer himself, allowed fellow competitors to pen their experiences in their own words. It's like spending a cold winter night with a dozen or so of your best friends.

The writers/participants were pretty hard on the cops who were just doing their job. I'm a former road-racer having run a couple of thousand mile "races" in a 1960 Corvette. These were all during the early 1960s before any interstates were open and I averaged 63 MPH. It took a few years, but I did figure out, it's more fun to be the chaser than the chasee. Driving the latest "Police Package" sedan and wearing a "city-kitty" uniform is a real kick. Sure it's exhilarating running high speed and trying to stay away from cops, but cops get to go fast, plus the added excitement of not knowing if the speeding car contains Cannonballers, murderers or . . . .

Cannonball is not only well written, but completely believable unlike The Driver, a not believable accounting of a similar race by the egocentric Alex Roy who used support vehicles including a plane to make his alleged run.

This 5-star rating is, admittedly, for true fans of this
sort of adventure, but for anyone who has ever wanted to
drive significantly over the posted speed limit for awhile,
or those who might have actually done so, this is a "must."
Brock Yates, the author, was one of the originators of the
real Cannonball Run, and he participated in all the genuine
runs, that took place from NYC to Calif, when the idea was to
see which team of drivers could make the quickest trip. The
rules at that time were, well, no rules. If that doesn't sound
like fun, then this book won't seem very exciting.
The idea at the time, when the speed limit was set at a federal
level of 55 mph, making it one of the most ignored laws in our
history, was for some guys (and gals) to get together and
bring whatever motor vehicle they wanted and try racing to
the other coast. Ethics? Rules? If you could get away with
it, it was permitted in these Cannonball runs.
Some of the funniest stories are about the various ideas of
subterfuge, to either avoid detection, or, if caught, to avoid
legal penalty, employed by all contestants.
Before various aspects of the law came down on the race, it was
run for several years, and they all had to be fun.
Yates knows all the stories, and he verifies the truthfulness
of the more wild ones, and no one has more knowledge of these
events than he does, and he seems to remember them all.
As he points out, there were some other, later, "copycat" runs,
but they were weak images of the originals, even when he had
something to do with them.
He also points out the futility of such runs today, with the
much heavier emphasis on speed enforcement--mainly as a revenue
producing action--and better technology and communicaton available to the police. In addition, and worse yet, he explains just how much more crowded our highways are, even the
interstates, these days, and how difficult it is to make any
real speed in any circumstance anywhere. "Wide open spaces"
have just about disappeared from the driving landscape, so we
can lament, with Yates, the lost freedoms of real fun driving.
Several other participants also contribute pieces on their
involvement, so the other perspective is interesting.
Yates was also involved in the filming of "Cannonball Run," and
you can feel his sadness as he recounts how his original idea
was lost as Hollywood "stars" took it over; the director brought
in his girl friend, and Reynolds insisted on several of his friends being included, and Yates was forced to continually
re-write the script to accomodate those personal wants, so
some actors were brought in who were not interested in the
story and who detracted from the finished product. This writer's insights into how the Hollywood world works, and the
forces that shape a film, sometimes contrary to a good story or
a good movie, are worth the price of this book by themselves.
The original Yates idea, sold to Hollywood, was to mirror the
actual event, which was funny and exciting in its own right,
and it was to have starred Steve McQueen, a genuine car guy whose power and intensity would have helped turn the orignal
script into a powerhouse movie. But, sadly on all counts, McQueen developed cancer, and he had to drop the project. It was all downhill from then on, and you can't help but feel for
Yates as he is, on the spot, forced to keep revising his script
for the benefit of those who didn't care about the original story or its impact.
As said, there are some amazing and fun stories here, and
no one knows them better than Yates, and he is one of the
preeminent auto writers today, so you need to get this one
if you have any interest in autos, and if you have ever dreamed
of a very fast road trip.

Lots of interesting stories and info on the people and vehicles participating in this event, and good reading if the Cannonball interests you. However, it's not tied together very well due to the variety of people writing it, some who know how to write and some who don't. I think a talented writer could put together a great story by interviewing some of the participants for more detail, and for each race, merging the various pieces into something that builds the excitement of the competition, adventure and suspense, and moves each person's story along concurrently. And Yates really is missing out by not seeing both "The Gumball Rally" and the original "Cannonball" with the Carradine brothers. "Cannonball Run" and "Cannonball Run II" had some funny moments, but were definitely not car movies.

I read this book in two days. Very interesting if you're a car buff; probably dull if you're not. I think it's unfortunate and sadly ironic that Yates never saw "The Gumball Rally" because that film captured the spirit of the Cannonball race far better than "The Cannonball Run" movie that he was involved in. But as Yates points out, that's not his fault. Burt Reynolds took over the film and pretty much ruined the whole thing. When you watch "Gumball", you know it's a film put together by people that love cars and respect people that like to race them, eg. the scene where they roar through the empty streets of Manhattan at six a.m. will make you wish you're there. "Cannonball" is just a very badly written, cheaply executed comedy. The cars are merely an afterthought. (If you really want to experience a nightmare, watch "Cannonball Run II" - probably one of the three worst movies released in the eighties.)

I hope Yates will change his mind and give "Gumball" a viewing. Yeah, they stole the idea from him, as the copyright laws allow, but the film demonstrates why the race had to have been so intoxicating.