MOTOR RACING AS A BOARD GAME? Can pushing a few counters around a printed track get anywhere near the excitement and noise of the sport? Perhaps not – but then plonking a tiny top hat on a blue square is not the same thing as being a Mayfair landlord. It’s imagination that makes it work.
Over the years there have been many attempts to capture the screech of tyres in more or less two-dimensional form and there are collectors out there hoping some faded, tattered box at a car boot sale will reveal an undamaged gaming gem. The truly lucky might find The Gordon Bennett Motor Race game from the early 1900s, with Edwardian racers pounding down a dusty road on the lid; slightly more common is the 1920s Brooklands game where landing on certain squares gives you a flat tyre or an oil leak.