The Secret of Shady Corner

When the weather is right, any Lake Placid winter tourist can buy the thrill of a lifetime--a ride down Mt. Van Hoeven-berg's famed bobsled run. He only has to lay down $1.50 and sign a waiver relieving the State of New York* of all responsibility. Since nobody on the tourist runs is out for the record and the rear crewman rides hard on the brake, the passenger is safe enough. In competition it's different.

Last week, with the two-man and four-man bobsled championships of the world to be decided, the tourists were kept on the sidelines. Hell-for-leathers from three nations--France, Switzerland and the U.S. --used oil and emery-paper to make their sleds even slicker and faster. One of the bobbers was 235-lb. Bill Casey, brakeman for one of the U.S. four-man entries. While the two-man championships were being run, Casey lined up with the spectators at perilous Shady Corner, a hairpin curve that has to be taken just right.

High & Soon. As Casey watched, the French sled rumbled into Shady, its steel blades skitting and chattering around the curve. It came so close to cracking up that Casey made a mental resolution to talk to French steersman Louis Saint Calbre. Two weeks before, the Belgian team's sled had catapulted over Shady's 22-ft. wall of ice in a practice run, killing the driver and leading to Belgium's withdrawal. The Frenchman was driving Shady the same way. Said Casey to himself: "I got to go up and tell him how to take it."

But Casey didn't get a chance to tell him. Next time down, the French sled careened high up the wall and was jerked down too suddenly: it crashed against the inside wall, and the public-address system blurted, "81, Shady . . . 81, Shady" (Lake Placid code for "send the ambulance"). The Frenchmen were rushed to the hospital for treatment of their injuries.

The secret of steering Shady Corner is not much different from the way a speeding motorist takes a highway curve when there is no white line. An experienced Mt. Van Hoevenberg bobber comes in high on the left side of the chute (about two to five feet below the crest), then steers down and out of it, picking up speed as he goes. A bobsledder who doesn't take Shady that way is likely to lose time, get out of rhythm and/or wind up in a hospital. Says one World War II airplane pilot, who tried a $1.50 ride: "There's nothing like it--except pulling out of a dive-bombing run."

A Use for Brakes. The Europeans, unused to downhill curves and accustomed to picking up speed on straightaways, were at a disadvantage at Mt. Van Hoevenberg. Nonetheless, a Swiss sled, driven by 28-year-old Felix Endrich (winner at last winter's Olympics), tore off with the world's two-man title. Average time for the 5,181-ft. course: 1:19.63.

Next morning, after workmen had spent all night spraying 20,000 gallons of water on the run to make it smoother and faster, Brakeman Bill Casey and his U.S. fellow crewmen adjusted their helmets and inspected their 507-lb. sled. The driver was ruddy-cheeked Stan Benham, chief of the Lake Placid fire department, who turned to bobsledding four years ago because he found ski-jumping too tame. When Benham said, "All right, let's go boys," all four took their positions for the push-off. Once in motion, with feet planted in stirrups and hands clutching straps, they tucked down their heads like monks in meditation and the sled picked up speed.

The public-address system rattled off their progress: "They're approaching Cliffside . . . they're through . . . they're stepping along, folks . . . they're at Shady . . . they're riding the curve . . . good in, good out . . . they're at Zig Zag and they don't stay there long . . . they're riding the finish . . . they're down."

Big Bill Casey used his brake for the first time, and the sled ground to a stop, about a city block past the finish line. They made the descent three times more before they pinned down the 1949 four-man bobsled championship. Average time: 1:13.32. Average speed: 46.8 m.p.h. Afterwards, Benham's No. 3 man, Jim Atkinson, felt his face and grinned: "Boy, was that wind cold." Somebody remarked: "It's all over but the drinking." Said Driver Benham: "I haven't had a drink in a long time . . . you can't drink and drive too."

* Whose Conservation Department runs the Mt. Van Hoevenberg courses.

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