AVUS or Avus and other inconsistencies in motorsport journalism Options

[Joe Fan]

Some questions for the Nostalgia forum knowledgables. Below are some examples I have noticed when reading motorsport articles that demonstrate inconsistencies and raise questions.

1) The AVUS or Avus circuit. I have seen this used both ways. Is AVUS an abbreviation of something? If so, then all caps would be correct.

2) Nurgburgring 1000KM, 1000Km, 1000km or 1000 KM, 1000 Km or 1000 km. Which is correct? I have seen program covers with about every variation. Typically kilometers (or kilometres if in Europe) are always lower case but if attached to an event, does both letters get uppercased? Or just the 'k' in km?

3) When referring to a F1 non-championship race, is it "non-Championship" or "non-championship"? I have seen both even when referring to non-championship sports car races. I was always under the impression that you capitalize the "c" in championship when referring to a Formula One World Championship event but since a non-championship race is not a World Championship race, there is no need to captialize the "c"

4) 2.5-liter and 2 1/2-liter (or 2.5-litre and 2 1/2-litre if in Europe) designation for British engines. In British motorsport journalism, they commonly used 2 1/2-litre when describing a British engine and 2.5-liter for Maserati and Italian engines (or non-British engines in general).

With this in mind, when writing for an American audience, using 2 1/2-liter for British engines and 2.5-liter designations of everything else in a piece of writing gives the appearance of inconsistency and poor editing to the American reader.

5) Alphonso de Portago. When stating a paragraph using his last name, should it be: De Portago or Portago?

If you have any other examples, feel free to share them.

[Wolf]

Joe, AVUS is akronym (Automobil Verkehrs und Übung Strasse), so should be all capitals...

Re 5) You mean Alfonso Antonio Vicente Eduardo Blas Angel Francisco Borja Cabeza da Vaca, Grandee of Spain, Count of Mejorada, Count of Pernia, Marquis de Moratalla, Marquis de Portago, Duke of Alagon. Sure, flows off one's tongue nicely...

[Drinky]

1) AVUS stands for Automobil-Verkehrs (und) Übungsstraße, though obviously the umlaut is for some reason not used in the acronym.

2) It should be 1000 km, see here.

As for the next two, that's likely to be mostly up to the writer's preference. English generally isn't very prescriptive, though there may be a clear favourite in the racing world, I don't know.

5) I would suspect it is De Portago. The "de" is part of his name and it's analogous to the Dutch/German "van/von" which is always included, but only capitalised when the first name is omitted.

[jarama]

Originally posted by Wolf
Joe, AVUS is akronym (Automobil Verkehrs und Übung Strasse), so should be all capitals...

Re 5) You mean Alfonso Antonio Vicente Eduardo Blas Angel Francisco Borja Cabeza de Vaca y Leighton , Grande of Spain, Count of Mejorada, Count of Pernia, Marquis de Moratalla, Marquis de Portago, Duke of Alagon. Sure, flows off one's tongue nicely...

Wolf,

don't forget the mother's family name, as usual in spanish.


Joe,

De Portago starting a paragraph, while the right spelling for the name is Alfonso.

Carles.

[David McKinney]

Joe, this is not meant as a criticism, but the answers to most of your questions could be found in a good grammar book. Much as I respect the knowledge of TNFers on motor racing matters, that is where their strength lies, not in the finer points of grammar.
There are clear rules governing many of the issues you raise, and where there are not, they will be governed by the 'house style' of whoever is publishing them. I personally would write 500km, but I might find a publisher whose own rule is to express it otherwise. Similarly, I prefer 1000, but am sometimes required to write it as 1,000.
As far as that Berlin circuit is concerned, I would contend that common usage has rendered it a word of its own, which means we can spell it 'Avus'. After all, we no longer insist on RADAR or LASER or SCUBA, all of which started off as acronyms

[Geza Sury]

Originally posted by Drinky
1) AVUS stands for [b]Automobil-Verkehrs (und) Übungsstraße, though obviously the umlaut is for some reason not used in the acronym.[/B]

I always wondered why it's not AVÜS. It should be! This sounds strange, though...

[theunions]

Numeric designations for North American races - especially in NASCAR. For instance, when referring to the Daytona 500 we all know that means 500 miles...but how many people outside North America know the Motor Trend 500 at Riverside was 500 kilometers or that the Sharpie 500 at Bristol is 500 LAPS?

Actually I'd call this more of a sanctioning body inconsistency than one perpetuated by the media...but it sure confused the heck out of me when I first started following NASCAR.

[Ray Bell]

David mentions 'house style' and he's quite correct...

However, I assume you're checking this for your book on MG, so it's basically up to you to dictate style.

My preference would be to stick to the rules as closely as possible, but as David also mentions, you might have a particular form that you like. I also like '1000km' without the space, and I don't think the world will topple if I leave out the space there.

As for the 2 1/2 litre and 2.5 litre (and 2 1/2-litre and 2.5-litre), I would much prefer the decimal designation. This, however, tends to imply that you should be a bit more particular with the actual size involved... a 2420cc engine is 2 1/2 litres, but it's really 2.4 litres if you see what I mean.

As writers we do have some responsibility to be upbuilding and to lead our readers on that path, as one old journo employer of mine once told me. "Always write to build up, never to pull down," if that applies. More important than anything is to keep to correctness as much as you can and to be totally consistent.

Having said that, one wonders how English readers will react to seeing 'De Portago' begin a sentence and then 'Portago' being mentioned within it!

[Udo K.]

Well, if you want to put it really correctly it should be A.V.U.S. - as it is an abbreviation and to
stress that you put full stops behind the letters.

I think its the same in English: B.R.M. or M.G. or B.A.R.

1000 km looks okay, as this was the version used by the A.D.A.C. (!) on their official race programs. Personally I like 1000 KM more - it looks better....

[paulhooft]

Makes me wonder
Did Enzo Ferrari.
When he had that works team
with all those men:
Alfonso Antonio Vicente Eduardo Blas Angel Francisco Borja Cabeza da Vaca, Grandee of Spain, Count of Mejorada, Count of Pernia, Marquis de Moratalla, Marquis de Portago, Duke of Alagon.
It must have cost a fortune!!!

because he already had Juan Manuel Fangio,Peter Collins, Eugenio Castelotti and some times Paul Frere and Olivier Gendebien to pay??
The man must have been
Totaly .....
Paul Hooft

[dmj]

Originally posted by David McKinney
Joe, this is not meant as a criticism, but the answers to most of your questions could be found in a good grammar book. Much as I respect the knowledge of TNFers on motor racing matters, that is where their strength lies, not in the finer points of grammar.
There are clear rules governing many of the issues you raise, and where there are not, they will be governed by the 'house style' of whoever is publishing them. I personally would write 500km, but I might find a publisher whose own rule is to express it otherwise. Similarly, I prefer 1000, but am sometimes required to write it as 1,000.
As far as that Berlin circuit is concerned, I would contend that common usage has rendered it a word of its own, which means we can spell it 'Avus'. After all, we no longer insist on RADAR or LASER or SCUBA, all of which started off as acronyms

Exactly. For some time I tried to write FIAT everywhere but decided it has no sense so switched back to usually accepted Fiat. And it really should be F.I.A.T. Or what about A.L.F.A. Romeo? Some names did change through years...

[Rainer Nyberg]

SAAB became Saab during the late 1960s, but you can still find the acronym with capitals today.

[ensign14]

2 words - or is it one? - Frazer (-) Nash.

Was it not Archie Frazer-Nash but the Frazer Nash car?

[petefenelon]

Originally posted by ensign14
2 words - or is it one? - Frazer (-) Nash.

Was it not Archie Frazer-Nash but the Frazer Nash car?

Hm, if I remember rightly, the car is NEVER hyphenated, but Archie Frazer Nash started double-barrelling himself at some point in the late 20s?

pete

[Joe Fan]

Thanks for all your responses.

As far as Archie Fraser Nash, I wouldn't hyphenate it. In Robert Edwards book on Archie Scott Brown he made a point at the front of the book acknowledging that sometimes Archie's name was found hyphenated in motorsport articles but he chose not to hyphenate it. I think hyphenation is more common with women who want to retain their maiden name. However, how is one to know whether Scott is a middle name or the beginning of a last name?

I think AVUS should be the proper way to type/write it but it is now probably acceptable either way for some of the reasons mentioned above.

1000KM vs. 1000Km vs. 1000km. Since kilometer is one word and since it describing an event rather than a length, shouldn't it be 1000Km? If I said the race was a 1000 km in length, the lowercase would be correct. But since I am talking about an event, 1000Km I think would be more correct. The argument as to why the km shouldn't be all caps is due to the fact that kilometer is one word. If it were two words, then both letters would be caps.

[David McKinney]

Interesting point about the km/Km thing, Joe. A bit like the Le Mans 24 Hours (not hours) - and I can't remember ever seeing a reference to the mille miglia:lol:
Archibald Goodman Frazer Nash changed his surname to Frazer-Nash in the early 1930s. The cars seem to have been spelt with and without the hiphen in the early years, but I think the authorities these days insist on no hiphen.
The tradition of adding a name at marriage is an American one, not English. The 1950s Ecurie Ecosse driver Sir James Scott-Douglas was, for example, descended from several generations of Scott-Douglases, and there are countless other examples.
The Edwards point about Archie is an interesting one. I haven't done detailed research, but would be surprised if he appeared as anything but Scott-Brown when he was racing.
There is also, as I think we have discussed before, the trick of people having two surnames. An example is the 1920s Bentley (etc) driver Bertie Kensington Moir, whose surname was Kensington Moir.
In the UK that practice, like doubling names with a hiphen, is regarded in some quarters as an affectation.

[fines]

FIAT became officially Fiat somewhere around 1905/6/7ish, and ALFA likewise Alfa Romeo. I always wondered about SAAB, though - I was under the impression it's still all capitals...

About the Tausend Kilometer, we have clear rules here in Germany (you know ), and it's a 1000-km-Rennen and a Formel-3-Rennwagen etc. Both examples are taken straight from the definite German orthographical guide, the Duden! Don't you have something like that in English????????????

[ensign14]

Originally posted by Joe Fan
1000KM vs. 1000Km vs. 1000km. Since kilometer is one word and since it describing an event rather than a length, shouldn't it be 1000Km?

The metric system dictates that it has to be 'km' with little letters.

The way metric works is that you have basic units, like the metre, gram, volt and so on, and add prefixes to them which make them a multiple of the unit, to avoid having long rows of zeroes (so 1,000,000,000,000 joules can be called a terajoule). These basic units are abbreviated (m=metre, obviously) and the prefixes are also abbreviated (T=tera).

However, the prefixes are upper case if they are for more than a million of a unit and lower case if they are less. This means that kilo, meaning a thousand, must be a little k.

They have to be strict with this rule because the same letter is used for different prefixes but it means different things if it is upper or lower case; a yottametre (Ym) is 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 metres, but a yoctometre (ym) is 0.000000000000000000000001 metres. So a slight problem if you get them mixed up...

[paulhooft]

it is to difficult for me,
but:
that may not be mean,
that it is really difficult..
Paul

[ozzy.g]

Originally posted by Joe Fan

5) Alphonso de Portago. When stating a paragraph using his last name, should it be: De Portago or Portago?

It's Alfonso....

By the way: absolutely "Portago" when you write it alone and NOT "de Portago". At least in Italian. As editor, I must know it very well (and though most Italian people write "de Portago").
I have some doubts for French (I should check some rules).
In an English text SHOULD be "Portago" as in Italian.

Hey, I am a bit late with this answer...

[WINO]

Seems to me that the use of "de" in de Portago should be defined by the Spanish conventions rather than Italian.

Since Johnny von Neumann [Austrian] was always referred to as von Neumann in the U.S. press, I presume the same would go for Alfonso, hence de Portago.


As for acronyms, how about M.A.T.R.A. and O.S.C.A., never used that way anymore. B.R.M. and M.G. may well have stayed unchanged because their letter combinations could not be pronounced as one word, unlike the other examples.

WINO

[David McKinney]

Originally posted by ozzy.g

In an English text SHOULD be "Portago" as in Italian.

Not so
In English the surname is the word or words used by the whole family. If all their names end "de Portago" then that's what they will be called. Or von or van or de la or anything else

[ozzy.g]

Originally posted by WINO
Seems to me that the use of "de" in de Portago should be defined by the Spanish conventions rather than Italian.

The problem is not Spanish or Italian conventions. The problem is that we are talking about EDITING and not grammar or else. And perfect editing is known by a few people only, in general editor which make books, dictionary, encyclopedia etc.
In Italian is Alfonso de Portago and Portago if you write it alone. No doubt about this, even if the papers write De Portago.
Trust me!

[David McKinney]

I certainly trust you regarding Italian practice
But as an experienced English language writer and editor I can assure that is not the convention in English

[WINO]

Or the convention in French, German, Dutch.......Spanish perhaps?

I am also starting to realize why English language autosport books produced in Italy are so hard to read.

WINO

[D-Type]

Do I understand this correctly. Are we saying that it's correct to write
"De Portago led Volontorio over the line", but "Fangio led Portago . . . "? or is it just the capitalisation and it should be "Volontorio followed de Portago . . . "

[David McKinney]

The convention in English is to say...
"De Portago led...."
and
"Fangio led de Portago"

(I suspect in American English is might be..."Fangio led De Portago... )

[WINO]

Even in the U.S. it would be de Portago. In other words, always a lower key d, unless the name starts the sentence.


WINO

[Mike Lawrence]

I am with Dave McKinney, especially on the de Portago issue. We are talking about English usage, so we write 'Milan', not 'Milano'. The French call the capital of England, 'Londres' and we change the pronounciation of Paris.

Scott Brown should never be hyphenated, it's a Scotch thing.

In my copy of the Guild of Motoring Writers' Year Book (could that be Yearbook?), Fiat Auto (UK) Ltd, lists itself like that but Fiat has paid a little extra to have the logo F I A T (caps, spaces, but no full stops) printed above its entry. Saab Great Britain ltd., is spelled like that, but the logo above reads SAAB. It is ALFA ROMEO on the badge proferred by Alfa Romeo (UK).

If they don't know, how can we argue?

I cannot get over DaimlerChrysler.

[D-Type]

Originally posted by Mike Lawrence
~
I cannot get over DaimlerChrysler.

Mike, what do you make of MotorSport?

[gerrit stevens]

Originally posted by ensign14
The metric system dictates that it has to be 'km' with little letters.

The way metric works is that you have basic units, like the metre, gram, volt and so on, and add prefixes to them which make them a multiple of the unit, to avoid having long rows of zeroes (so 1,000,000,000,000 joules can be called a terajoule). These basic units are abbreviated (m=metre, obviously) and the prefixes are also abbreviated (T=tera).

In the Netherlands points and comma's are used oppositely.

So it is 1.000.000.000.000
and 2,5 litres (iso 2.5 litres).

I agree km is lower case.


Gerrit Stevens

[Nikos Spagnol]

Same in Portuguese:

1.000 kilômetros (kilometers)

2,5 litros (liters)

[Barry Lake]

A very interesting thread. Lots to think about here.

But there is a difference between correct grammar and publishing style.

Some things have been changed to a particular style simply because they look bad on a page of print. A double space after a full point or full stop is one example. Always taught to typists for letters, it looks terrible on a printed page of copy, as in a magazine. Single space is usual style.

I am not sure how many agree with me on this, and my now-decades-old but, I believe, still current Fairfax (Sydney Morning Herald) style book is out of reach to check what it says, but I have always disliked the look of, for example, B.R.M. in a sentence. Grammatically correct, yes, but looks better in print as BRM, I believe.

Using upper case for any more than three letters can be jarring, also. Which perhaps is why MG and BRM and the like survive and are acceptable, while SAAB, ALFA and FIAT are less so.

One I have been taught from my earliest days in the business - although it isn't universal, is style for numbers when included in copy: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12...100...1000...10,000. Why? Simply because a single digit in a sentence doesn't look right, "...for 5 laps...", "...for only 1 lap...". Also, the number 1,000 can look disjointed, whereas 10,000 looks OK.

Someone put a lot of time and thought into these things a long time ago, like the design of Times Roman type face, still the easiest of all to read, and which should not be enlarged or reduced. Each point size was designed in its entirety to look right at that size and no two point sizes are exactly alike. Although what worked in hot metal doesn't necessarily also work in modern computers.

The above comes from what I learned in "Publication Typography" and "Layout and Design" courses at technical college, from the Fairfax style book, and from practical experience working with some very experienced and knowledgeable people over the years.

Perhaps the most important point of all is that, whatever style you choose, it should be used consistently throughout the publication. Inconsistency jars the senses more than almost anything else.

[ozzy.g]

Originally posted by David McKinney
I certainly trust you regarding Italian practice
But as an experienced English language writer and editor I can assure that is not the convention in English

I didn't answer to your replay, because it is obvious that I trust your English editing knowledge. My words were for another member.
Anyway, I think I had your point.
I wrote that in English SHOULD be the same as in Italian. Well, I wanted to say: " I believe that in English is like in Italian (so Portago only) but I am not sure", and not that the same rule is applayed for English editing too.
Sorry for the misunderstanding. It's my bad English.

[ozzy.g]

Originally posted by WINO
Or the convention in French, German, Dutch.......Spanish perhaps?

I am also starting to realize why English language autosport books produced in Italy are so hard to read.

WINO

What do you mean exactly?
Or which are your difficultes?

[ozzy.g]

Originally posted by Barry Lake
A very interesting thread. Lots to think about here.

But there is a difference between correct grammar and publishing style.

Originally posted by Barry Lake

I am not sure how many agree with me on this, and my now-decades-old but, I believe, still current Fairfax (Sydney Morning Herald) style book is out of reach to check what it says, but I have always disliked the look of, for example, B.R.M. in a sentence. Grammatically correct, yes, but looks better in print as BRM, I believe.
Using upper case for any more than three letters can be jarring, also. Which perhaps is why MG and BRM and the like survive and are acceptable, while SAAB, ALFA and FIAT are less so.

The matter is that BRM or UK and so on are ACRONYM (abbreviation). In Italian is SIGLA.
An acronym MUST be written without points. So: BRM, FIAT, UK.
Yes, in general capital letters are not so good in a paper or in a book, so an acronym should be written with the SMALL CAPITALS (it depends on the choise of the publisher for all his paper/books).
BUT, if the word has become a familiar word (not only in current language, but also inside a publication), it should be written with capital only for the first letter: that's why, for example, Fiat (in any paper) or Avus (in any motor book). Then there is also a rule that can exist for certain publisher, the one you were talking about (more than three letters).
Anyway, ABSOLUTELY not B.R.M. or F.I.A.T. and so on. Brr...

I see that you spoke about another thing.
Chilometers is ABSOLUTELY km and NOT Km or KM.
Litres is l and not L and so on.
These are not acromyns or abbreviations, these are SYMBOL (sign) and they are written in the same way in the whole world and ALWAYS in the same manner (and sometimes they have capital letters, yes). So: km, l, kg, m, Kw and so on. In general they are present in any dictionary: it is not a case...

Originally posted by Barry Lake
One I have been taught from my earliest days in the business - although it isn't universal, is style for numbers when included in copy: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12...100...1000...10,000. Why? Simply because a single digit in a sentence doesn't look right, "...for 5 laps...", "...for only 1 lap...". Also, the number 1,000 can look disjointed, whereas 10,000 looks OK.

Yes. In Italy we arrive, in general, to twelve, but it is better, specially if you speak about quantity and not values (metric or else), to write any number (at least inside a hundred) with letters (ex: there were thirty drivers; not: there were 30 driver. Twenty laps to go and not 20 laps to go).
And, last but not least, in Italian books no points for four digit numbers: so it's 8654 and not 8.754. I don't know if it's the same for English with the commas.


Then, your last sentence, it's the FIRST RULE each editor MUST FOLLOW.
If a publisher wants B.R.M. for all his book is not a problem even if it's ugly and uncommon: the most important thing is that you check that it is ALWAYS B.R.M.!
Obviously that is not applayed for symbol, because km is always km!

I see, you should be a very good editor!

[WINO]

Ozzy,

The first page of one of the Orsini/Zagari books that happens to drop open may serve as an example:

"Their top machines didn't prove themselves sufficiently reliable for a sum of reasons related to the too-intense an activity that they carried and at the same time the validity of their numerous competitors. The races at Mugello and Montenero were further confirmations of this tendency and provoked the moral defeat of the men as well."

And the next page:

"While nothing was said officially, within the racing environment it was murmured a deliberate accident, explained by a sentimental delusion that had disturbed the too-sensitive soul of the driver."


WINO

[Doug Nye]

Originally posted by Mike Lawrence
Scott Brown should never be hyphenated, it's a Scotch thing.

Intentional I presume Mike? Mustn't let my Scots-born missis see this - she'll detonate, and it's been peaceful round here just lately...

I must confess I habitually use 'AVUS' in caps without full stops between the initials. Avus irritates me, yet contemporary AVUS race programmes use the upper-case initial, lower-case final three letters form. Plainly they are WRONG.

DCN

[Roger Clark]

Originally posted by ozzy.g
The matter is that BRM or UK and so on are ACRONYM (abbreviation).

They're not actually. An acronym is a word formed from the initial letters of other words; radar is a well known example. Fiat is an acronym, F.I.A.T. is not. FIAT might be, depending on how you pronounce it.

[David McKinney]

Wino
I'm with you on Orsini & Zagari
It might be acceptable to write in that wordy, florid style in Italian - but it doesn't translate
Any comment, ozzy?

One point that hasn't been made is that styles change over the years. I am sure that when I was at school it would have been incorrect to use BRM for B.R.M. But not now.
That is also an example of the specific rather than general change - as B.R.M. became better known it turned into BRM.
I seem to remember reading that the Fiat company formally changed its name from FIAT to Fiat around 1906 - about the same time that Mercédès officially became Mercedes.