OP mentioned being on a wood bridge - i assume that means the driving surface/deck may have been wood as well? That certainly would have helped as a wooden deck would have significantly lower friction that a classic asphalt or concrete surface and also wouldn’t become ‘sticky’ as it heated up like asphalt (bitumen) does.
When I was a teen we would put diesel on the road to make it slippery for burnouts. It also created a pleasing additional quantity of smoke and smell.
We called standing burnouts ‘diesels’ for this reason.