Monaco Aerial Rally
The Monaco Aerial Rally was a competition held on 1−15 April 1914. Participants traversed seven different routes with multiple landing sites, each covering a total distance of 1,293 kilometers. They were required not necessarily to stop but to land and roll for at least 10 meters on the ground. At Marseilles and Genoa they were to land on the ground and take off from the water. First prize was 25,000 francs; all prizes together totaled 75,000 francs.[1]
Roland Garros made the first, second, and sixth fastest flights, on the Monaco–Paris and Brussels–Monaco routes. His fastest flight covered the 1,293 kilometers in 12h 14m 21s (speed ≈ 106 km/h). Marcel-Georges Brindejonc des Moulinais, Eugène Renaux, and Pierre Verrier took third through fifth places with considerably longer times (53–63 hours).[2]
The Royal Aero Club had responsibility for organizing the London−Monaco route (which passed through Clais, Dijon, Marsaeilles, and Tamaris.)[1]
As the rally began, Flight published an editorial attributing lack of news interest in the Rally to the ongoing phenomenal advance of aviation:
Last week we were able to publish the full details of the Monaco Aerial Rally, one of the most important events that has ever been attepted in connection with aviation. As will have been gathered from the details given, seven routes have been fixed, with their starting places at important European centers, and competitors will be required to cover distances of roughly 800 miles across sea and country. [...] the Press of this country has hardly deigned to notice that such an affair is in contemplation. [...] aviation is still young enough to cause us to marvel at its progress day by day. Therefore, we cannot but read into the apathy—or comparative apathy—we have noted evidences of that progress which has in so few short years brought the science to a point where its possibilities are accepted as of no more than passing news interest.
In the matter under review, we have been watching our daily papers for information of what has been done or what is going to be done by the seven and twenty entrants who intend to take part in this most interesting "rally," but apparently the foreign correspondents no longer regard these things as important enough to cable. Think of it! The preparations for a competition such as this, involving cross-flights by every competitor of nigh upon a thousand miles, hardly worth the expenditure of two-pence-half-penny a word to record! And when we think that it is but four or five years ago the same journals kept a special staff of correspondents waiting and watching for days to see the first conquest of the Channel by a heavier-than-air machine! Can anything more significant, more eloquent of progress be imagined? We think not.[3]
The 1914 event might have been the third such rally; see Publication B2p0917e05, 1912, The Monaco hydroaeroplane meet and Publication B2p0918e01, 1913, The second Monaco hydraeroplane meet.
References
Publications referring to Monaco Aerial Rally
- Publication B2p0917e03, 1914, The Monaco aerial rally, 1914 (Simple title: The Monaco aerial rally, Journal: Flight)
- Publication B2p0917e09, 1914, The Monaco rally, 1914 (Simple title: The Monaco rally, [1914], Journal: Flight)
- Publication B2p0918e05, 1914, Twenty-one entered in Monaco aero rally (Simple title: Twenty-one entered in Monaco aero rally, Journal: Aero and Hydro)
- Mortane, 1914, The Monaco aerial rally (Simple title: The Monaco aerial rally, Journal: Flying)
| Event names | Monaco Aerial Rally |
|---|---|
| Event type | competition |
| Country | Monaco |
| Locations | Europe |
| Start date | April 1, 1914 |
| Number of days | 14 |
| Tech focus | Airplane, Marine |
| Participants |
