Nazis, Blowers, And Bugattis: Grand Prix Racing's Supercharged Years
Top-level grand prix racing's fascination with forced induction doesn't start with 2014's turbo V6s, nor did it get going with the first turbo cars of the '70s and '80s. It started 90 years ago, with the supercharged era.
Add a cockpit to a Mercedes–Benz Silver Arrow and it turns into a speed record mecha with wheels. In October 1934, Rudolf Caracciola used this W25 to break the world record for the one-mile standing start. The same day, on a one-kilometer run, he became the fastest man on a public road, at 197 mph. That road, 30 miles…
Tazio Nuvolari, deer hunter with Silver Arrow
Hunting game and racing cars are generally pursued as separate pastimes, but not by Tazio Nuvolari at the 1938 Donington Grand Prix, where, as evidenced by a severed head, he did both with great aplomb.
Mercedes–Benz’s great Libyan racing swindle
Before Libya became the recently killed Muammar Gaddafi’s silly desert kingdom for 42 years, it was an Italian colony which hosted the Tripoli Grand Prix, the fastest motor race of the 1930s. Fed up with four years of Silver Arrow dominance, the Italians changed the rules for the 1939 race to make sure an Alfa Romeo…
Budapest’s secret Grand Prix street circuit
This Sunday will mark the 75th anniversary of the Hungarian Grand Prix, an event held since…1986. Fifty years before Formula One came to the Hungaroring, there was a Grand Prix race in downtown Budapest with 100,000 people in attendance. The Silver Arrows came. Scuderia Ferrari came. Three-quarters of a century later,…
All Silver Arrows, all the time
If you like your race cars silver, wicked and German, Motorhome is a tumblr you should check out: nothing but photos of Silver Arrows, like this Auto Union A-Type, page after page after page.
Silver Arrows In Flight
Formula 1 racers Jacky Ickx and Hans-Joachim Stuck took to the streets of Monaco last May in Auto Union Silver Arrows Type D and C, respectively, briefly creating an eight wheel, 28-cylinder piece of history. [HellForMotors]
Michael Schumacher’s Red Helmet of Bad Luck
Michael Schumacher might want to watch that new red helmet of his. The last man to wear one in a Mercedes grand prix car, Manfred von Brauchitsch, was nicknamed Der Pechvogel: the unlucky bird.
Mercedes-Benz's Silver Arrows
With yesterday’s acquisition of Brawn GP, Mercedes-Benz will return to Formula One after a 55-year hiatus. Judging by their earlier attempts to build race cars, every team has reason to be very, very afraid.
Jenson Button Drives 1934 Mercedes-Benz W25
The W25 was the first Silver Arrow, and one of many to make an appearance at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. Watch the F1 championship leader drive it 75 years after its German debut.
