Inthe 1890s, cars were still a relatively untested technology. Various steam-powered contraptions had been chugging along the roadways since the late-18th century, but more lightweight, driver-friendly vehicles had only arrived on the scene as recently as 1886 when German inventors Karl Friedrich Benz and Gottlieb Daimler developed gasoline-powered autos with internal combustion engines.
Cars were considered the playthings of the super-rich, and the notion of racing them was almost entirely foreign — as foreign as we deciding to colonize Mars.