Qui Me Comitat Vincebit
Mille Miglia
ON MAY 1st [1955] motor-racing history was made…., But let
us go back to the beginning, for this win was not a fluke on the spur of the
moment, it was the result of weeks, even months, of planning and preparation.
Our preparation for the Mille Miglia was thorough. Rossi had entered his C-type Jaguar months before, we booked ferry tickets a week before, spoke briefly about packing space (lack of) the day before, and met in Dover at the map shop half an hour before departure – on what was to be an epic 8 days of solid driving. The trip down to Brescia was long. For any future Rossi navigator victim, my advice is to pack whatever creature comforts that make a night spent in a layby off the E17 a bearable experience. Thankfully, these introductory hardships were rectified by our eventual arrival at the pre-booked hotel at Desenzano on Lake Garda.
A very long hot Thursday was centred on the square in Brescia, during which time car snobs galore pointed and whispered over whether the assembled fleet was genuinely genuine, fake or – to use current terminology – authentically reconstructed. Of the 370 entries, only 14 were from England (was there something else going on that weekend?), less even than the Argentinian contingent of 21. Mercedes revelled in their sponsorship of the event with an entry that included "the" 300SLR driven by Jochen Mass. Sponsors bestowed upon us an assorted ton of goodies. I have no idea where everyone else managed to fit their Burago models, coffee-table books and umbrellas – we eventually found a lift for ours back to Desenzano.
The 12-hour wait was finally over and we set off for supper in a monastery and then into the queue down the crowd-lined red carpet to our 9.30pm start. To our surprise and delight we were given a cheery send off by TOPS member Stephen Curtis who was in Europe seeing how many events he could fit into his May calendar. During the afternoon we had purchased an egg timer - an instrument that was to prove invaluable – yet completely inadequate – in our quest for victory. A few yards before the Start Ramp we tried in vain to synchronize watches with the official timekeepers. Why they couldn’t have positioned this clock a mile back I don’t know… panic prevailed.
…we sped on our way through Vitterbo, sliding this way and that, leaving
the ground on more occasions than I can remember, yet all the while feeling
completely at ease, for such is the confidence that Moss gave me, and round the
corners I never ceased to marvel at the superb judgment with which he weighed
up the maximum possible speed at which he could go, and just how far he could
let the car slide without going into the ditch or hitting a wall or rock face..
Rossi soon became acquainted with Italian driving methods. With a police motorbike escort, we passed through towns and villages at 95mph forming a fast middle lane in a narrow 2-way street. This technique did require a certain amount of care as was realised too late by two entrants who came a cropper (hitting each other) on the second day.
The Italians cheered us on like only the Italians can. Farmers jumped up and down on their tractors; little old ladies sat alone on the pavement (in some cases just yards from the action) and waved white hankies; equally little old men waved walking sticks and an army of school children frantically waved Mille Miglia flags. Even at 2.30 in the morning when we stopped in Ferrara for the first night’s sleep (3 hours), the whole town seemed to be out to watch. Schools were given the day off – roads that were usually closed were opened – towns turned out in force: flags, television cameras, church bells, wine and song – it was virtually a national holiday.
Early on we made the mistake of stopping at a set of red lights – the assembled crowd at that junction left us in no doubt about what they expected to see. As far as they were concerned, the more noise, speed and tyre-squealing we were able to provide the better. Rossi obliged.
By now the details of our route were perfected and I now wrote them all
down on a special sheet of paper 18 feet in length.
To those – like me – who have not done the MM before, it seems inconceivable that we should set off on a 1000-mile rally without a map. Not that we didn’t have maps of all shapes and sizes, we just didn’t ever need them – every inch of the route was lined with people demonstratively showing us the way. That having been said, it would be fair to assume that it was impossible to get lost…. well, yes, until we decided to follow one of the high-speed police motorbikes and found that actually he was speeding to the scene of an accident unrelated to the MM – we did feel a bit silly having overtaken miles of standstill traffic only to arrive at an overturned Hyundai and its miserable occupants. There was no one remotely interested in escorting us back!
The competitive element of the MM is a series of time checkpoints, secret checkpoints, ability trials and regularity trials. At each checkpoint, while our route card was whisked away and stamped, the mayor – with the support of huge crowds, cameras and commentary – bestowed upon us the delicacy of the town. This ranged from medals and money belts to pork sandwiches and vino. However in Gambettola we were treated, (with the usual glamour and ceremony) to a beautifully wrapped dry bread roll.
The first regularity section was complicated by the fact that we (ok, I) couldn’t find the rules. We arrived into the section at high speed (Rossi having just had to floor it across a time check after a bit of a faux-pas brought about by him apparently thinking I’d been counting ‘up’ when quite clearly I’d been counting ‘down’). We quickly fathomed that something was a bit different about this section as we passed a Lister and Ferrari both doing about 20mph. We braked, and then worked out a stunning strategy: if we kept the Aston that we had been following ‘just out of sight’ we would be going at about the right speed – needless to say, we soon saw the flaw in this otherwise brilliant plan.
From the finishing line we drove round to the official garage, where
the car had to be parked and Stirling asked "Do you think we’ve won?"
It gradually became apparent at the prize-giving on Sunday morning that if we had been in the running for a pot we’d have had an early morning phone call. Those called to the stage to accept prizes had donned suits and elaborate evening dresses. We later found out that we had come 235th (!) which is just as well really as I don’t know where in the C-type I could have packed my ‘little number’. The appalling extent of our defeat was printed and bound in individual results books in time for a lunch at Brescia castle – we had managed to score points at only 4 of 35 checkpoints. At one timecheck we were just one second early (after 7.5 hours) and scored not a single point.
Elated but exhausted we turned North and drove back whence we came.
T.D.P
Quotes from Motor Sport 1955
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