In 1908, the Savannah Automobile Club, with several Isle of Hope representatives on its Executive Committee, hosted the annual championship races of the Automobile Club of America. The Grand Prize race, whose course is shown by this map, was truly an international competition with German, French, Italian and American entries among the twenty teams.
One of the reasons Savannah was selected as the race site was its splendid roads and beautiful scenery, especially along the circuit of roads in its waterfront suburbs, including Isle of Hope. These roads formed the 25-mile course that the racers would lap sixteen times with a winning average speed of 65 mph. The course included straightaways where speeds reached 100 mph. However, the stretch at Isle of Hope, from Skidaway Road to Parkersburg Road to Bluff Drive to LaRoache Avenue, had several sharp turns that greatly reduced the speed to 37 mph. One race car of team Italia ran off the course at Isle of Hope and did not finish. (Special Thanks to Dr. John Duncan)