Faster: How a Jewish Driver, an American Heiress, and a Legendary Car Beat Hitler’s Best

I had trouble connecting with this book. It describes Grand Prix and rally racing of the 1930s – the “Golden Age of Auto Racing,” this era is called. Racing, especially then, is, by nature, visceral and sensory, and I felt disconnected from it.

The central theme is that Hitler and the Nazis used auto racing in the 1930s as a propaganda tool. Hitler loved cars, apparently, and auto racing was held up as the pinnacle of German engineering superiority. Mercedes Benz and Auto Union (which would become Audi) were the German standard bearers of Nazi excellence.

Auto racing in the 1930s was a pretty grisly affair. People died, a lot. The cars were deathtraps, and the drivers were considered fearless heroes. And perhaps the book skewed it a bit, but they seemed to get far more news coverage back then than they do today.

So the conditions were perfect to paint a French-German rivalry as a proxy for the coming war. The book covers several races – both Grand Prix and rally – during the 1930s, but the entire thing is leading up to the 1938 French Grand Prix where the showdown would be between a Jewish Frenchman – Rene Dreyfus – against the legendary Mercedes Silver Arrows.

As the subtitle spoils, the Frenchman won, much to the German’s dismay and humiliation. It was played up in the French press as a huge setback for the Nazis. When they finally invaded France, the book implies (but never quite corroborates) that the Nazis tried to find the records and the car of that fateful race and destroy both.

The book is an interesting look at the historical period and cultural battlefront of which I was unaware. But I never really got into it.

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