(from Chapter 1 - "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

...Between 1915 and 1924,  seventeen large board surfaced tracks were built across the nation.  These spectacular venues varied in length from one to two miles.  Each featured a racing surface made of two-by-four boards laid on the two-inch edge, so that the resulting four inch depth minimized bending.  Tracks varied somewhat, but on most tracks the corners were banked at about sixty degrees….The boards rumbled and creaked….

1923 – The Insane Character

(from Chapter 1 - "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

... "I'd go down by the Harley shop at night when they're all out in front drinkin' beer out of The Growler -- the can across the road.  And they used to crowd Indian guys into the curbing…. I was a little nutty of course -- and I said,  'Look, I'm going to ride up and down by here, and if any of you fellahs want to do any crowding, come on out…. they thought I was insane, which I was.

    (Click here to hear Rollie's own words)

1935 – The Most Competitive  

(from Chapter 2 - "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

... Berkley Peck: Rollie Free was “…  the most competitive man that ever lived!  He really was. Everything was competition to Rollie, even from the car he drove down the street, to the car he drove in the 500, to the motorcycle that he rode.  And everything was wide open with him."

The 1938 Daytona Beach Records

(from Chapter 3- "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

... Harley waited for six weeks for a perfect beach down there (for the timing of the tides to provide a smooth wide beach early in the wind-free morning).  When I ran it, it (the beach) was so rough that the fuel would come out of the bowl of the Scout in the middle of the mile and cut out and come back on again.  I'm talking about a real rough beach.  But hell, the Scout run so good I didn't have to worry about gettin' a record.  I could beat a hundred and two-oh-four-eight [actually, 102.047] with my wife on back."

  (Click here to hear Rollie's own words)

1942 - Lt. Roland Free

(from Chapter 3- "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

... With the job came the privilege of accompanying the Colonel on a field trip. "It just happened that Bonneville, Utah, Salt Flats are not far from the Wendover, Utah, Air Base. I flew over on an inspection trip (of Wendover Air Base) in a B-24 as an aide to my Colonel. We had a very good look at the expanse of salt that Captain Eyston, John Cobb, and others had used for world record runs with automobiles...The view was unforgettable..."

The new Beat-Harley Strategy

(from Chapter 5 - "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

... At Rosamond, Free's had enjoyed his first successes with British motorcycles, both as a J.A.P. rider and a tuner of the Vincent H.R.D. and the Ariel...He had been thinking about Vincent H.R.D. motorcycles ever since going to work for Vincent "Mickey" Martin a year earlier.  If he had any doubts as to Vincent H.R.D. performance, such doubts were lifted at Rosamond.

 Riding to Immortality

(from Chapter 6 - "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

...Free had one other new twist, one other way to improve the odds.  A mile north of the course, he stopped the H.R.D., and turned the throttle over to De Mott.  While Bill kept the engine running and the plugs clean, Rollie handed his helmet to Mel Held and accepted Margaret's bathing cap.  The officials would be none the wiser when he screamed by the tower….

 Nerves of Steel

(from Chapter 7- "Flat Out!  The Rollie Free Story")

...Marty Dickerson remembers: “….the bike went down on its side…. it did a slow roll in midair and landed on the other side and it just stayed there but spun as it was sliding -- in a circle as it was sliding….” [Afterwards] “…he was steady as a rock…. the guy basically had nerves of steel."