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No novelty, the Bonneville Salt Flats have been in their present position and equally well suited to high-speed automobile driving for centuries. One hundred miles west of Salt Lake City, they are part of the dried-up bed of prehistoric Lake Bonneville which once covered most of northwestern Utah. For 200 square miles the residual salt is as flat as a concrete highway, so hard that iron tent-stakes often bend when driven in. In the winter two inches of rain cover the flats, leave a fresh, white, marble-smooth surface in the spring. There is no dust. Moisture in the salt cools friction-heated tires. The salt's resistance minimizes skidding. There are two concentric circular tracks at Bonneville, one twelve and a half miles around, the other ten. For Sir Malcolm a 13-mile straightaway was laid out near the Western Pacific Railroad tracks which cross the flats from east to west.