Clarence Leslie Davis
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Clarence Leslie Davis 02 MAY 1873 • California DEATH 18 JUN 1946 • Trinity, California
Clubs
THE BIG ONE ON THE END.
Clarence L. Davis was born twenty-two years ago and began bicycle-racing, like hundreds of other famous racing men, when he was nineteen years of age. He is the largest man on the quadruplet team, weighing 174 pounds and standing 5 feet and 10 1/4 inches.
Davis' first work was on August 27, 1893, when he won the mile handicap of the Bay City Wheelmen meet. Just two months later, at San Jose, he broke the coast record for the half mile in his heat of the half-mile handicap, but had the bad luck to fall in the final.
In the Admission Day races of the Garden City Cyclers, the same year, Davis won the five-mile championship of San Jose and the mlle handicap.
On October 2d at the Sacramento meet, where Edwards rode his greatest race, Clarence Davis won the two-mile, beating both Ziegler and Wells, and in the mile and three-mile State championships he beat out Ziegler, Wells and Edwards, besides other fast Coast riders less known than them. That was a great year for Davis as well as Edward and Zeigler and at the beginning of last year Davis was considered the equal of both of them, but 1894 proyed a bad year for Clarence, who only raced two months, and almost at the beginning of his track work got an ugly fall while training on the quarter at San Jose and injured both knees. He found it almost impossible to get in shape, and, finally, after the San Diego meet, gave up the racing until he went into actual training for the work on the quadruplet. As Davis needs hard work to get in winning form, the judgment of a trainer is required to fit him. How well Aylward has looked after him the wonderful mile of Saturday shows.
[Drawn by an "Examiner" artist from a photograph by Bushnell.]
NEARING A MILE A MINUTE. - Something About the Four Men Who Rode the Quadruplet Bicycle and Edwards' Own Story. - The San Francisco Examiner, 11 Feb 1895
NEARING A MILE A MINUTE. - The San Francisco Examiner - February 11, 1895
There was more trouble on the sixth relay, through and around San Jose, and it was here, on their own ground, that the Garden City Cyclers "played in hard luck" and lost exactly two minutes.
Their man Navlet started on even terms with Davis, the Olympian, and all went well until a stray dog attempted to cross the road in front of him. Navlet struck the dog, and over he went, suffering a terrible fall. His wheel was wrecked, and he was badly bruised, but he mounted his trailer's wheel when the latter reached the scene, and bravely finished his ride.
It was a bad accident and the Garden Citys feel that they practically lost the race there in their own town. What happened to the dog cannot be gleaned from the accounts of the trouble.
The Bay Citys did not do well on this relay. In fact, Davis' riding was so speedy he left the others all the way from one to five minutes behind. The Alamedas were now 15-1/2 minutes behind. Cardinell of the California Club did not ride well, and his club dropped back to ninth position. His time, 35 min. 05 sec., would indicate that he must have met with an accident, though none was reported.
...
SIXTH RELAY.
Position
at
finish.Rider. Club. Time. Actual
Riding
Time.1 C. L. Davis Olympic 11:44:30 28:46 2 Gus Navlet Garden C 11:46:30 30:46 3 B C. Raynaud Bay City 11:47:00 30:13 4 M. F. Rose Acme 11:47:15 29:28 5 Joseph Belloli San Jose 11:50:00 32:11 6 C. D. Gooch Reliance 11:52:00 30:06 7 M. M. Cook Imperial 11:52:15 28:15 8 E. Elliott San Fran 11:53:00 31:26 9 J. D. Cardinell California 11:53:30 35:05 10 F. G. Thomas Alameda 12:00:00 30:42 Fastest time - 1894, 30:00: 1895, 28:30.
Hails from the cycling center of the Pacific Coast, San Jose. In 1892 at Sacramento a surprise was sprung on the public in the form of a dark horse, or a 100 to 1 shot. All the cracks had been in continual training and each considered himself in fine form, but their disappointment was great when Davis jumped the bunch and went down the stretch a clean winner. He has won many races since then, and will win many more, although he has been racing probably longer than any rider now in competition on the Coast. Clarence has very little to say, but is a deep thinker, and this class of riders keep the rest guessing all the while.
CLARENCE L. DAVIS 06 Mar 1897, Sat The Record-Union (Sacramento, California) Newspapers.com
Clarence L. Davis, a giant in stature and a lion on the track, is now for the first time this season in fine form. Davis in 1893 rode like a whirlwind and man after man went down before his terrific sprint. He is the largest racer on the count, weighing in condition 190 pounds, and this weight along with mighty strength gives him the power to send a bicycle along with the speed of an avalanche. Davis is now preparing himself for a big match race at twenty-five miles unpaced and it is safe to predict that he will make the other fellow hustle.
