Modern Board-Track Racing Revival in Germany
A pack of early racing motorcycles on a wooden bicycle track looks like something pulled straight out of the 1920s. The machines are narrow, loud, and almost impossibly simple. The riders crouch over low handlebars while the steep banking does most of the work keeping them in the turn.
These photographs were taken at a 2012 board-track meet in Hannover, Germany, where a group of vintage motorcycle enthusiasts finally got the chance to put real wood under their wheels. They had already run the old racers on paved and concrete circuits, but a wooden velodrome brought the machines much closer to the tracks they were originally built to race on.
Back on the Boards in Hannover
The Hannover event was not a modern race dressed up with a few old-looking motorcycles. The field included Harley-Davidson, Indian, Excelsior Super X, and other early machines built or restored in the board-track style. Some used original engines and major components, while reproduction frames, tanks, wheels, and other hard-to-find pieces helped return motorcycles to the track that otherwise might never have existed as complete racers again.
Very few genuine board-track motorcycles survived a century of racing, wrecks, scavenged parts, and ordinary wear. An original engine in a carefully built reproduction racing chassis can be a more honest way to use the machinery than pretending every nut and tube left the factory together. The point of these bikes is not simply to sit under lights in a museum. It is to hear them run and watch them climb onto the banking.
The riders also dressed the part. Racing sweaters, leather helmets, goggles, boots, and simple trousers made the scene look convincing, although none of that equipment offers the protection of a modern helmet and full racing leathers. That choice adds plenty of atmosphere, but it also makes the speed look more serious when the motorcycles begin moving around the track.
It appears that rear brakes and more controllable throttles are on at least some of the motorcycles. Looking at the value and rarity of the machinery, that is hard to argue with. A small concession to control does not erase the character of a vintage racer, especially when a broken part could destroy something that took years to find or build.
Why a Bicycle Velodrome Fits the Story
Motorcycle board tracks grew directly out of bicycle velodromes. The earliest purpose-built American motordromes appeared around 1910, with a large Los Angeles track often identified as the first major example. It was a one-mile wooden oval, and contemporary descriptions tell of two-by-four lumber set on edge to create the racing surface. As promoters chased more speed, banking became steeper and some shorter tracks developed turns that looked more like walls than corners.
That is why the Hannover track is more than a convenient place to ride an old motorcycle. Its wooden surface and bicycle-track layout connect the revival directly to the earliest years of the sport, when motorcycles first began racing on steeply banked velodromes. Those early wooden tracks soon pushed builders toward lighter frames, stronger engines, and machines designed to run flat-out.
Board-track racers were stripped down for speed. They used rigid frames, narrow tires, low handlebars, and very little that did not help the motorcycle go faster. Many purpose-built machines had no transmission and no conventional clutch. Direct drive meant the engine turned whenever the rear wheel turned, so the motorcycle had to be push-started and kept moving until the rider was ready to stop.
Brakes were also left off many racing machines. Depending on the motorcycle and period, the rider could control speed through the throttle, ignition cutout, or by shutting the engine down, but there was no brake lever waiting to rescue a bad line. The exact controls varied, so it is safer to say that the classic board-track formula favored direct, minimal machinery rather than claim every racer was built exactly the same way.
Factory racing became serious business during the same period. Harley-Davidson, Indian, and Excelsior used competition to prove their motorcycles and sell road machines. Harley’s first large factory-backed effort at the 1914 Dodge City 300 was run on dirt rather than boards, but it belonged to the same rapidly developing racing world. Manufacturers were learning that wins, records, and famous riders could be as valuable as ordinary advertising.
With engines tuned hard and motorcycles carrying almost nothing beyond the parts needed to run, speeds climbed past 100 mph on the larger tracks. A rider sat inches above narrow tires with no suspension at the rear and little protection from the track, the motorcycle, or the other racers. It was spectacular, but there was almost no margin for error.
The Part Nobody Needs to Recreate
The wooden tracks were fast because they were steep and smooth when new. They also aged badly. Boards loosened, gaps opened, splinters appeared, and oil from total-loss engines made the surface slick. At the Hannover meet, the riders reportedly had to stop after a plank broke. That was a small reminder of what the original racers dealt with on a much larger scale.
The danger was not limited to the men on the motorcycles. Spectators sat close to the track, often above or outside the banking with little separating them from a machine that left the boards. In 1912, Eddie Hasha crashed at the Vailsburg Motordrome in Newark, killing himself and several spectators. Accidents like that helped give the tracks their grim “murderdrome” nickname.
Board-track racing did not disappear for one simple reason. Deadly crashes damaged its reputation, wood tracks were expensive to build and maintain, and aging surfaces became harder to justify. Dirt tracks were cheaper and could produce close racing without constructing a giant wooden stadium. The Depression added more pressure, and by the early 1930s the classic motordrome era was largely finished.
Many of the riders who made their names on the boards continued racing elsewhere. Jim Davis raced for both Indian and Harley-Davidson and became one of the important figures linking early board-track competition with the dirt-track racing that followed. Factory machines also changed with the sport. By the 1930s, specialized hillclimb and speedway racers such as Harley-Davidson’s DAH and rare CAC competition model showed where serious racing development had moved.
Original Engines, Replica Parts, and Practical Controls
The German revival sits somewhere between restoration and living history. Andreas Wehrmann, one of the riders connected with the European scene, built a 1918-style Harley-Davidson around an original 61-cubic-inch F-head engine and a reproduction Keystone frame. The Keystone design removed the lower frame rails and used the engine as a structural member, lowering the motorcycle and giving it the lean profile associated with factory racers.
That particular Harley was prepared much like an early race bike, with engine work, a large Schebler carburetor, and no clutch, transmission, or brakes. Other motorcycles in the revival take a less absolute approach. Some have discreet braking systems or controls that make them easier to manage without changing the overall appearance. From a few feet away, the long frame, narrow rims, rigid rear section, exposed valve gear, and low bars still read exactly as they should.
Modern board-tracker customs go even further. Builders have used Sportster, Honda single-cylinder, and modern aftermarket V-twin engines in frames shaped to resemble early racers. Hidden disc brakes, electronic ignition, modern internals, and limited suspension can make those motorcycles practical enough for road or exhibition use. They are inspired by board-track racing, but they are different from the vintage and reproduction racers being run at Hannover.
The distinction is easy to see once the motorcycles are moving. A show bike can imitate the stance. A real vintage racing engine being push-started onto a steep wooden turn brings back the mechanical demands that created the shape in the first place.
A Rider’s View of the Wooden Track
The photographs capture the machinery well, but the video gives a better sense of the track. One motorcycle carried multiple cameras, including a rider’s-eye view that shows how quickly the banking rises and how little room there is to relax once the motorcycle is committed to the turn.
When this event was first covered, the video ended with a teaser suggesting the riders might return in 2013. That invitation is now a piece of the event’s history, but the footage still gets most of us closer to a genuine wooden board-track run than we are ever likely to get in person. Watching it is considerably cheaper than checking flights to Germany, although probably not as much fun.