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Detroit, 5:55 AM
Tue Dec 8
29 posts in the last 24 hours
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[www.4tforum.gr]
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Heck, Raikonnen wouldn't have needed to move and take $15m of compensation if he were born 90 years earlier!
11/19/09
Racing versions of road cars racing through towns and countryside? Sounds like WRC for me!
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I was visiting the hallowed ground of Brooklands a while back with my other half, and we stopped by the Formula 1 exhibition. After a wander around I noticed a few pictures up high on the wall, among them a great photo if Nuvolari with that infectious ear-to-ear grin.
Brooklands is staffed by volunteers, a great bunch of blokes who represent the history of british engineering and have more stories to tell that I've had carb-related breakdowns, and it was one of these fine fellows who approached us and started to chat about his respect for Nuvolari. We shared a few stories - he hadn't heard my favourite, which is that after his amazing win at the 'ring in '35 where he stuffed the Silver Arrows in an underpowered Alfa, there was a photo taken of him flanked by Teutonic drivers of immense stature. The winners garland he wore hung down to his knees because the German organisers didn't think he'd stand a chance of winning so they made it to fit their own. They also had to borrow a copy of the Italian national anthem because they saw no point in bringing one along.
As we chatted, he talked about how Senna and Nuvolari were about the same height but definitely didn't have the same temperament. He walked myself and my girlfriend over to one of Senna's show cars, pointed out that the original seat liner Senna used to use was still in place, lifted the cordon, and encouraged my other half to try the car for size as she was of a similar height to Senna.
As she climbed in and remarked on how strange and enclosed the driving position felt, he grinned as if in recollection then fired off the final tale.
A few years before he'd found himself chatting to an Italian lady who was visiting with her car-mad young son. He was running from car to car, struggling to fit everything into his overwhelmed little mind at once, and when offered the chance to sit inside a car he literally jumped at the chance. Whilst he was happily wedged inside a single seat trainer, his mother was talking about cars being in the family's history and mentioned that she had a great uncle she'd never met who was apparently notorious in the family for his love of driving too fast. He'd also raced a bit as far as she'd heard. What was his name, asked the keeper? 'You probably won't have heard of him', she said, 'his name was Tazio Nuvolari'.
He said he'd never forget her face when he took her over to that very same photo and pointed it out :)
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But probably getting tossed from the car was infinitely safer in those days without roll cages and firewalls.
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See, Bode Miller was right about one thing. You should get to drink the champagne.
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