[start-test type=8]

[start-block]

Early automobile races were run on open roads lined with spectators, until an accident on the Madrid-Paris race in 1903 killed ten people. A dalliance of the wealthy elite, open road racing might have continued if one of the drivers, Sir Peter Braithwaite, hadn’t remarked that only the loss of the driver was lamentable as the others killed had been “mere peasants”. The public fury caused by the remark led to a prohibition of this type of racing in Europe. The most famous of the early American races was the Vanderbilt Cup held on Long Island, NY but it suffered a similar ban in 1911.

Automobile racing first appeared as a sport in 1894, when a Paris newspaper organized a competition for mechanically propelled vehicles. A number of races quickly followed, including the first American race, in 1895, between Chicago and Evanston. The Grand Prix of France, the first competition to take place on a specially constructed circuit, was held at Le Mans in 1906. The Indianapolis Motor Raceway held its first race in June 1909 on a dirt track and repeated it in 1910. The track was bricked over the next year and the first Indianapolis 500 race was held on Memorial Day.

Classifications and events proliferated, with frequent changes in regulations regarding weight and engine displacement. Media coverage, as well as massive sponsorship from automobile companies, pump a fortune into racing each year but it's the spectators who have turned it into one of the world's most popular sports. In the United States it is second only to horse racing. The Indy 500, for example, attracts about 300,000 people, the greatest annual attendance at a sports event in the country. Norman Mailer likened it to the gladiator fights, depicting its attraction as being nothing more than blood lust.

[question text="What is the subject of the passage? " answers="The dangers of automobile racing#The popularity of automobile racing#*Automobile racing as a sport#Speeds achieved in early automobile racing "] 

[question text="What is true of the Vanderbilt Cup race? " answers="*It was run on open roads until 1911#It began in 1894#It was the cause of an accident in which eleven people died#It was from Long Island to the center of New York "]

[question text="Where was the first purpose built track? " answers="Long Island#*Le Mans#Indianapolis#Rome "] 

[question text="Why was open road racing stopped? " answers="Because of the death of Sir Peter Braithwaite#*Because of negative publicity#Because it put drivers into danger#Because it was the dalliance of the wealthy elite "] 

[question text="What word could best replace 'prohibition' in paragraph one? " answers="Postponing#Halting#*Banning#Legalization "] 

[question text="When was the first automobile race run? " answers="1906#1895#1911#*1894 "] 

[question text="What answer could best replace 'proliferated' in paragraph three? " answers="*Multiplied#Were prohibited#Diminished#Were numbered "] 

[question text="When did the first Indianapolis 500 take place? " answers="June 1909#Memorial Day 1910#Memorial day 1906#*Memorial Day 1911 "] 

[question text="Why did Norman Mailer liken automobile racing to gladiators? " answers="Because of the danger to spectators#*Because of the danger to drivers#Because it is one of the world's most popular sports#Because of the media coverage and sponsorship "] 

[question text="What does the pronoun 'it' in paragraph three refer to? " answers="The Indy 500#The United States#*Automobile racing#Horse racing "] 

 

 

[end-block]

[end-test]