Sig Haugdahl - the record where hype bit back?

J.Alex Sloan ran the International Motor Contest Association (IMCA), an organisation which ran races at various fairgrounds around the USA throughout the early half of the 1900s, providing an alternative to the American Automobile Association (AAA) sanctioning body and its rules and its bureaucracy. However, Sloan was also known for staging the results of races (known as hippodroming at the time), and for applying considerable hype. Titles were invented for his drivers, and new names created to make his drivers seem more mysterious and foreign. So when he teamed up with Sig Haughdahl in April 1922, built a car and achieved a "record speed" of 180.3 mph, it was considered yet another piece of hype aimed at attracting punters through the turnstiles. But should it have been?

The issue is discussed in Dirt Track Auto Racing - 1919-1941, a pictorial history by Don Radbruch. The car used was called the Wisconsin Special, after the 766 cubic inch aluminium World War I aircraft engine used to propel it, and the record attempt took place on Daytona Beach. There were no officials from any record keeping body present, but some reports from the time credit Haugdahl which achieving speeds of 162 and 171 mph. Bill Tuthill, in his book Speed on Sand in 1978, stated that IMCA went to great efforts to ensure the accuracy of the record run, that the length of the course was surveyed and the timings devices certified before and after the run. Additionally, he wrote that "while the milestone was never recognised by the AAA, a careful check of every bit of information, including eye witnesses, proves that the 180.27 mph record by Haugdahl was unquestionably authentic." Perhaps the reason for the AAA not recognising the record (note that even if the AAA recognised the record, that didn't mean that the European AIACR would, hence the US land speed record was higher than the World Speed Record at the time) is that Haugdahl simply hadn't paid his dues to the AAA. Racing historian Al Powell, talking to Radbruch in Dirt Track Auto Racing, notes that when he was talking to H.C.Wilcox in the 1950s, Wilcox having been present at the record attempt, this fact was established. Wilcox said that Haugdahl sent his dues my mail to the AAA, but they denied receiving it and asked for another payment. The argument rumbled on, and Haugdahl finally lost his temper and told them where to go.

And so we are left with this mystery - a record supposedly set, but no-one willing to recognise it. It would seem that Sloan's hype had bitten him back. Not that it worried him - Sloan took the car around with his circus and demonstrated it on the short ovals, taking numerous track "records" along the way.