Tag: monaco

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Historic Racing Photos

High Flying Formula Vee Action

Nick Brittan takes the road less traveled at the 1967 Monaco GP support race

You’ve heard me extoll the virtues of the Formula Vee racing class. I adore it for it’s simplicity: A stock VW Beetle front beam; a 1200 cc Beetle engine; and a stockish tranny. How could that not be a good time? On top of that, the grids for the vintage Vees tends to be a good spot for tight racing with skilled drafts and dramatic overtakes.
Compared to this image from the support race for the 1967 Monaco GP, though, today’s Formula Vee races are positively tame. Apparently the rough and tumble formula vee racers weren’t a great cultural match with the champagne sipping Auto Club Monaco crowd and went on to prove it by opening their event with the bumping and pushing that you might expect of the unwashed.

This shot of Nick Brittan’s rather unconventional overtake near the yacht harbor chicane really probably didn’t do much to improve their reputation in the principality as evidenced by this bit from the Motoring News GP Report:

“The Formula Vee race opened proceedings and proved only that such unstable cars should not be allowed near a race track. The only British driver involved, Nick Brittan, arrived at the chicane on his first lap to find a French-driven car sideways on in front of him; he hit it and rolled, falling back on his wheels, fortunately with no personal damage.”

More history of Formula Vee at Volkswagen Motorsport.

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Video

1961 Formula Junior at Monaco

Our earlier post about the ex-Team Tyrell championship winning 1961 Cooper T56 for sale had me wanting to see her in action. If you can find Tony Maggs’ Cooper in this very brief clip of a 1961 Monaco Formula Junior race, then you have better eyes than me. The car would have been wearing number 126 for the event.

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Ferrari Grand Prix Racing Drivers Video

Onboard with Fangio at Monaco

These weren’t little GoPros hanging off of the Maestro’s Lancia. Each of these cameras had to be loaded with film, started up, and run a few laps. Then they had to do it again and again so that you don’t see the giant camera in the other angles. It’s easy to dismiss the complexity of these earlier onboard films when we can easily toss a half-dozen or more digital video cameras on a car at every possible angle. It’s part of what makes early onboard footage so precious.

Looking through the slow motion montages in this clip, I have to believe it was part of the inspiration for Saul Bass’s racing sequences in Grand Prix.

via Retro Formula 1

Categories
Grand Prix Historic Racing Photos

Pioneers in Racing Air Conditioning

Carlo Felice Trossi at the 1934 Nice GP
Stirling Moss in a Rob Walker Lotus 18 at the 1961 Monaco GP

Why swelter under the hot summer sun when you can have a cool breeze soothing you on a Sunday drive? Carlo Felice Trossi in his Alfa at the 1932 Nice GP and Moss in his Rob Walker Lotus 18 at 1961’s Monaco GP demonstrate.

Categories
Grand Prix Historic Racing Photos Racing Drivers

Driving Styles at Monaco. 1955.

Driving Styles at Monaco. 1955.

Another photo that wouldn’t be possible to take of a contemporary driver—they’re too well hidden.

Categories
Grand Prix

Scenes from the 1929 Monaco Grand Prix

Every untouchable, unalterable tradition needs to start somewhere. For Monaco, the thankful holdout for the round-the-house Grand Prix, it was April 14, 1929.

Race winner William Grover-Williams in a Bugatti T35B (12) alongside #22 Raoul de Rovin in a Delage 15S8
1929 Monaco Grand Prix – Marcel Lehoux, Christian Dauvergne, Philippe Étancelin
  • Rudolf Caracciola in a Mercedes SSK at the 1929 Monaco Grand Prix
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Grand Prix Video

A Bit of a Wiggle-Woggle

Then again, why just listen to Graham Hill talk about Monaco when we can just ride shotgun.

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Grand Prix Video

Graham Hill on the “Proper Road Race”

If you’re going to get an audio tour of Monte Carlo’s road racing circuit, you may as well get it from Mister Monaco.

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Grand Prix Video

Monaco Grand Prix 1936-37

Most of the prewar footage of Grands Prix that I come across are very short; a minute or two. The days of endlessly long recording time were still quite a ways off, particularly for cameras small enough to report trackside. As a result, we have precious little footage of Nuvolari or Caracciola. By these standards this wonderful clip is an epic film at 2 minutes and change.

It’s in clips like that that the legend of Monaco really shines. If this were any other track (except maybe Indianapolis) it would be so marred by change that this footage would be unrecognizable. Thankfully, the shots of the tunnel or Station Hairpin have meaning to us today. These aren’t simply clips of brave men careening through city streets, they’re the pioneers that allowed Jenson and Hamilton to round these same corners today. If not for these early GP giants, Monaco would have long since been replaced.

Categories
Grand Prix Video

Two Views of Monaco 1955

Here’s two fantastic visions of the 1955 Monaco Grand Prix. One is a news blurb style recap in color(!), with a focus on Moss and Fangio’s Mercedes team. I quite like the shot of the pack on the far side of the track, weaving through the Monte Carlo streets. It’s a view we don’t often see of the races today with cameras on every corner of the track. Somehow, seeing the cars in the distance like this makes it feel more like you’re there than seeing every straight and turn.

The other, a home movie shot on grainy 8mm. I can tell you which one I like better. Can you believe how close to the track you were able to stand, filming away happily while these shiny rockets screamed past, narrowly avoiding lamp-posts and curbs? The closeness and immediacy of the home movie displayed below really puts you on the sidewalks of Monte Carlo, as if you briefly glanced over at the passing racing cars on your way into Hermés. It is footage like this that keeps Monaco on the calendar today.

Even if huge portions of the romance are gone, Monaco is still magic.