The police in Lodz host drag races to prevent less safe illegal races.

By NICHOLAS KULISH

LODZ, Poland - People drag-race on the main avenue here in broad daylight, and the police just stand by and watch. That is, until the commissioner steps up to hand trophies to the winners.
Gleaming sports cars mingle with souped-up speedsters incognito in the form of stubby Fiats - and everything in between. “Are you kidding me- Suzuki never made a blue engine,” one of the organizers shouted, after opening a car’s hood during the prerace inspection.
Poland has a new hobby, cars, and the faster, the better. And in Lodz, municipal officials have struggled to deal with an explosion in the number of illegal races on public streets.
“You have young people with powerful machines that until recently older people would have to work their entire lives to afford,” said Jaroslaw Woloszynski, the police commissioner. The police said cracking down on the activity was difficult, because racers would just stop their cars when officers arrived; handing out tickets for violations was usually the best they could do.
As a result, municipal leaders in Lodz set up events in which car owners, overwhelmingly young and largely male, could challenge one another in organized races. The city government even spent close to $20,000 to buy timing equipment.
“Because we were christened the capital of street racing, we decided to live up to the name,” said Lech Ryszewski, 60, chairman of the Lodz Automobile Club .
“The Polish soul has always been drawn to horses,” he said, citing the country’s proud cavalry tradition, “and today it’s horsepower.”
A generation ago, Poles living under Communism had to wait years to own a car, if they were ever able to. Poland’s recent economic success has meant a surge in car ownership.
Mix in a stronger currency, rising employment, and higher wages, and the car has gone from being a luxury to an expectation. In Poland, where the population is about 39 million, the number of motor vehicles on the road grew from 9 million in 1990 to 18 million in 2006, according to a report commissioned by the Polish Automotive Industry Association.
But because Poland still lags behind its more affluent neighbors, with ragged roads and few race tracks, young drivers turn to the streets in impromptu events.
With so many new drivers on the overcrowded roads, and the young racers also present, safety had become a huge concern. So officials in Lodz decided to “hold out our hands” to young people, Mr. Woloszynski, the police commissioner, said. “We just want to let people go fast and let them do it safely.”
Participants in the public races said they appreciated the safety precautions. “When we were racing illegally, we had people who could come out in front of the car,” said Viper, one of the organizers, a 26-year-old whose real name is Lukas Wozniak.
Mr. Woloszynski said illegal racing had been reduced by 80 to 90 percent. But one serious racer said they were still racing illegally at night.
“You’ve got different types of people,” said Pawel Zel, 21, a bartender.
“Some want the adrenaline rush of racing. Some want the rush of breaking the law,” said Mr. Zel, who acknowledged that in the past he had participated in illegal street racing. “There’s far fewer people who actually race illegally now.”