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by David Finlay (13 Dec 07)
It also marks the 80th anniversary of the first event. Four Italians developed the idea, but the initial inspiration came from just one of them; this was Count Aymo Maggi, a successful racing driver himself, who wanted to encourage Italian manufacturers to develop exciting sports cars (as they had done in the past and, oh my, were certainly to do again in the future). He was also keen to promote the northern Italian town of Brescia, near which his family had a large estate. What arose from these ideas was a race whose like has never been seen since. Throughout its history it was contested over approximately one thousand miles (that's what mille miglia means) on open public roads, always starting and finishing in Brescia and on all but one occasion venturing as far south as Rome. You might want to spend a moment thinking about that. A thousand miles driven flat-out on roads that were invariably open to everyday traffic. In the early years this was a feat of endurance as much as anything else - the winner of the 750cc class in the inaugural event took nearly 34 hours to complete the course. Later on, bravery became as important as stamina. In 1955 Stirling Moss famously won the race (one of only two victories in a non-Italian car, both achieved by Mercedes-Benz) at an average of just under 100mph. And yes, there was still traffic on the roads. One of the best-known facts about that result was that Moss was aided by his co-driver, the journalist Denis Jenkinson, who read out notes so that Moss knew what was coming next (memorising the whole route being as near to impossible as makes no difference). In fact this wasn't a new idea. Hans Klenk did the same for Karl Kling three years earlier, and this crew might have become famous for it if they had won. They nearly did, but a problem at a pit stop delayed them by an estimated six minutes and gave victory to Giovanni Bracco, who did not seem to feel the need for directions. In the words of author Anthony Pritchard, "all Bracco's co-driver had to do, it was said, was to light him cigarette after cigarette and keep passing him the flask of brandy." Pritchard also describes Bracco as "an alcoholic maniac". Quite a colourful turn of phrase, that, and one of relatively few in nearly 250 pages of text. Pritchard is not an author who lets the stories get in the way of a good fact, which means that his Mille Miglia book is a tremendous reference work but not necessarily one that will attract people who don't already know about the event and its history. The Mille Miglia was a richly romantic race - how could it not have been? - but little of that comes across. Tazio Nuvolari's unbelievable drive in 1947 (he finished second by 16 minutes in an 1100cc Cisitalia against a 2.9-litre Alfa Romeo, having stopped for 20 minutes to fix a drowned distributor, while suffering from the lung disease which would eventually kill him) is "recounted in emotional tones" separately from the main text in a long quote from the Nuvolari biography by Count Giovanni Lurani, as if Pritchard doesn't want to have anything to do with it. He is also quite straightforward about the race's demise in 1957. One of the first stories I ever heard about the Mille Miglia was that the dashing Alfonso de Portago brought his Ferrari in for a pit stop but refused to change tyres because it would waste time, then stopped a few miles down the road to kiss a pretty girl before crashing fatally when a tyre gave up the struggle. Apart from the bit about the fatal crash (which also killed many spectators and brought the race's history to a sharp and tragic end), the story is complete nonsense, but it's a good piece of Mille Miglia folklore and might have been mentioned if only to debunk it immediately afterwards. This is not Pritchard's way, though, and some readers will find his sober style ideal. Personally, I would have liked the book to thrill me as this partly magical, partly horrifying race itself thrilled so many thousands of people during its 30 years of existence. Mille Miglia: The World's Greatest Road Race, by Anthony Pritchard, is published by Haynes at £35.00. ISBN 978 1 84425 139 1. More details at www.haynes.co.uk . |
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