Map of Marchbanks road course, circa 1960
I just bought a program from the Marchbanks Road Races held Sept. 17-18, 1960. I'll post the entire program later but I wanted to share a cool map that I had never seen showing the layout and dimensions of the 9-turn, 1-8 mile course.
The course was the site of the first road races at the newly rebuilt and renamed Marchbanks Speedway. The weekend features 13 races in a variety of sports cars, open-wheel cars andmotorcycles. There even were two "Ladies" races.
The program said Marchbanks was "the only course in the West where the spectators can see everything that goes on from one convenient location in the grandstand, the only course where the entire perimeter of the course has a solid guard rail to protect the spectators, and, of course, the only Western course with this exciting banking," a reference to the track's famed high-banked Turn 1.
Knowing that this was one of the first races at the rebuilt track, the program refers to the track's lack of landscaping and "polishing up." "Experts are betting that it will go down in history along iwth Torrey Pines, Pebble Beach, Riverside as one of the West's great road courses."
RELATED STORIES: Read more about Marchbanks Speedway and Hanford Motor Speedway in my Marchbanks section, including the regularly updated "History of Marchbanks Speedway, aka Hanford Motor Speedway."
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