Qualla: Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash

Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash: Introduction

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Garpct, CC0. The finish line was a hotel bar. Specifically, the bar of the Portofino Inn in Redondo Beach, California, where drivers who had just crossed the entire United States at illegal speeds — averaging 80, 90, sometimes over 100 miles per hour across four time zones — staggered in to sign a register and order a drink. The Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash was not a race, its organizers insisted, because races are illegal. It was a 'rally.' A 'demonstration.' An act of automotive civil disobedience in the name of a simple proposition: the 55-mile-per-hour national speed limit was an absurdity, and they would prove it by ignoring it, in public, repeatedly.

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Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash: Brock Yates and the Beautiful Outrage

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Garpct, CC0. Car and Driver editor Brock Yates dreamed up the Cannonball in 1971, inspired partly by the legendary driver Erwin 'Cannonball' Baker, who had set transcontinental speed records in the early twentieth century. The idea was simple: start from the Red Ball Garage in midtown Manhatt...

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Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash: Dan Gurney's Ferrari

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Garpct, CC0. The race that made the Cannonball famous was the first run in 1971. Dan Gurney — Formula One race winner, Le Mans champion, founder of Eagle cars — drove a Ferrari Daytona with Brock Yates in the passenger seat and covered the 2,863 miles from New York to Redondo Beach in 35 hour...

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Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash: The Fastest Run

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Garpct, CC0. The event ran five times: 1971, 1972, 1975, 1979, and a final unofficial run. The fastest time was set in the 1979 edition by Dave Heinz and Dave Yarborough in a Jaguar XJ-S, who completed the route in 32 hours and 51 minutes. They averaged better than 87 miles per hour door-to-d...

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Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash: The Movie

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Garpct, CC0. Brock Yates wrote the screenplay. The 1981 film 'The Cannonball Run' starred Burt Reynolds, Roger Moore, Farrah Fawcett, and a cast of celebrity cameos doing a Hollywood version of what the actual runs had been. The movie was a massive commercial success, spawning a sequel, embed...

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Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash: The Portofino Inn

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Garpct, CC0. The Portofino Inn in Redondo Beach was chosen as a finish line partly because it was near the water — the 'shining sea' of the event's name — and partly because it was a reasonable hotel with a bar that would be open when exhausted drivers arrived at irregular hours. The inn stil...

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