Foto dell'autore

Brock Yates (1933–2016)

Autore di Cannonball!: World's Greatest Outlaw Road Race

23+ opere 349 membri 5 recensioni

Sull'Autore

Brock Wendel Yates was born in Lockport, New York on October 21, 1933. He received a bachelor's degree in history from Hobart College in 1955 and served in the Navy. He was an automotive journalist who wrote for Car and Driver magazine. In the 1970's, he founded of the Cannonball Baker mostra altro Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash, more commonly known as the Cannonball Run. He wrote the script for the 1981 movie The Cannonball Run. He wrote several books during his lifetime including Sunday Driver: The Writer Meets the Road - at 175 MPH; Enzo Ferrari: The Man, the Cars, the Races, the Machine; and Cannonball! World's Greatest Outlaw Road Race. He also wrote Sport and Racing Cars with his father Raymond F. Yates. He and Jerry Belson wrote the script for the movie Smokey and the Bandit II. He died from complications of Alzheimer's disease on October 5, 2016 at the age of 82. (Bowker Author Biography) mostra meno

Comprende il nome: Brock W. Yates

Opere di Brock Yates

Sunday Driver (1972) 27 copie
NASCAR Off The Record (2004) 7 copie

Opere correlate

The Cannonball Run [1981 film] (1981) — Writer — 134 copie
Smokey and the Bandit II [1980 film] (1980) — Writer — 34 copie
Reader's Digest Today's Best Nonfiction 41 1996 (1996) — Autore — 10 copie
Car and Driver, April 1967 — Collaboratore — 2 copie

Etichette

Informazioni generali

Nome legale
Yates, Brock Wendel
Data di nascita
1933-10-21
Data di morte
2016-10-05
Sesso
male
Nazionalità
USA
Luogo di nascita
Lockport, New York, USA
Luogo di morte
Batavia, New York, USA
Istruzione
Hobart College (BA|History|1955)
Attività lavorative
automotive journalist
Organizzazioni
Cannonball Run
Premi e riconoscimenti
Motorsports Hall of Fame of America

Utenti

Recensioni

First edition signed by many, fine
 
Segnalato
dgmathis | 1 altra recensione | Mar 15, 2023 |
Outlaw Machine is an amiable, readable book, but not a particularly disciplined one. Brock Yates, a veteran automotive journalist, clearly loves Harleys and wants to tell the reader everything about them. By and large, he does. A skeptical look back at the Hollister “Riot” (a 1947 incident that triggered a moral panic over motorcycles and their riders) bumps up against a long, detailed, and surprisingly engrossing chronicle of Harley-Davidson’s evolution as a company. An overview history of outlaw-biker culture jostles against vignettes of Harley enthusiasts (uniformly law-abiding, mostly wealthy) across the world. Surveys of changing models full of detail about engine components, horsepower, and torque share space with windy pop-sociology theorizing about the cultural appeal of the Harley.

Weaving through the semi-random structure of the book is a fascinating paradox: Harley-Davidson bikes are technological relics, yet they remain wildly popular. They are enormously heavy, hard to maneuver, underpowered for their size and weight, prone to breakdowns, and generally inferior – by any objective measure – to more modern, foreign-built bikes. Yet they have vast legions of dedicated followers who love them fiercely and would never consider switching to another make or model. Why?

There’s a lot going on in that paradox: Economic nationalism, the appeal of tradition, motor vehicles as personal statements, the enduring image of the biker-as-rebel, rejection of progress as an end in itself, and the burning desire of (some) people for machines that require the user to meet them on their terms. A careful, disciplined writer could build a book around it, teasing out the strands and the way they interweave, but Yates is not that writer, and Outlaw Machine — loose and baggy where it should be tight and focused — is not that book. It’s entertaining reading, though, especially for those who dream of a Harley beneath them and an open road ahead of them.
… (altro)
 
Segnalato
ABVR | Apr 2, 2016 |
Cannonball: World’s Greatest Outlaw Road Race
Author: Brock Yates
Publisher: MBI Publishing Company
Published In: St. Paul, MN, USA
Date: 2002
Pgs: 281

REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS

Summary:
The Cannonball Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash, a coast-to-coast, New York to California road race. Movies were made. Stories were told. It actually happened, 4 times in the 1970s. In the days of the death of the American muscle car, when CAFE standards, corporate average fuel economy, were limiting the emissions and power of cars on American roads, these outlaws, inlaws, protesters, and proud Americans went on an odyssey across America. The idea being that well trained drivers could control their vehicles safely at necessary speeds and safely cross America, that there was no reason that the American Interstate System couldn’t stand alongside the German Autobahn. These are the stories of the drivers and the drive told in the words of the folks who actually drove the race.

Genre:
Adventure
Autobiography and memoir
Behind the Scenes
Biography
Film
History
Non-fiction
Society
Sport and leisure

Why this book:
I loved those movies. And the idea of reading the true stories of the actual races appealed to me.

This Story is About:
courage, working hard, doing the right thing, greed, friends, jealousy, love, caring, happiness, sadness, family

Story title is short story collection:
Favorite Character:
Brock Yates, the head outlaw in charge.

Least Favorite Character:
Shame that Robert Redford’s schedule wouldn’t let him do that initial run.

Character I Most Identified With:
Couldn’t find a character here that I really identified with. I see characters here that I recognize as archetypes that I’ve known all my life.

The Feel:
The book is on heavy magazine paper which is sorta cool. Gives it a different feel...even though that’s not the feel that I usually refer to in this section.

I wish this would have been more story and less recollection. I wanted this to be something that it wasn’t going to be. I liked it. But...just pipe dreaming.

Favorite Scene:
The realization that that wing they put on top of the van they made the initial run in was looking cool, but that was all it was good for as it ate mph and extra gallons of fuel.

One of the teams showing up dressed as priests as their Highway Patrol camouflage for the race. And The Right Bra Racing Team...obviously from their team picture, not wearing the aforementioned article of clothing.

The ambulance run.

The bra less Right Bra Team.

Pacing:
The pace is slow. To be expected in a book that isn’t really a story, but rather the recollections of people who took part in the various runnings of the Cannonball.

Plot Holes/Out of Character:

Hmm Moments:
The comment that was made after the 2nd Cannonball rings essentially true for me.
...We have maintained for a long time that a competent driver, in a good handling and braking car, is safer at 100 mph than an ill-handling, ill-braking hulk with a petrified driver at 50.

Makes me sad that so many of those who ran in these coast-to-coast rallys looking back on them from today’s perspective seem to be ashamed of it. I’d wear it like a badge of honor. Just makes me sad.

Reading about Yates hopes for the Cannonball Run movie and the way things turned out is sad.

Why isn’t there a screenplay?
There were a couple movies made from the bones of the Cannonball. None of them caught what Yates was looking for.

Casting call:
It’s a shame that the Cannonball movie with Paul Newman didn’t get made. That could have been awesome. No doubt, that movie would have held closer to Yates vision.

Last Page Sound:
Well...

Author Assessment:
It’s a decent read. I might like to peek at some of Yates other stuff just to see what his style is like on other subject matter.

Editorial Assessment:
Fine.

Knee Jerk Reaction:
it’s alright

Disposition of Book:
Library

Would recommend to:
genre fans
… (altro)
 
Segnalato
texascheeseman | 1 altra recensione | Jun 8, 2014 |

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Statistiche

Opere
23
Opere correlate
6
Utenti
349
Popolarità
#68,500
Voto
½ 3.7
Recensioni
5
ISBN
40
Lingue
6

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