The era of Road Racing - The Cars

Road racing is, sadly, a thing from the past. There are still some street-circuits, but legends like the Mille-Miglia, Targa Florio and the old Spa circuit (I think Spa is still awesome though). Most of these races are gone because of the extremely fast prototype cars of the early 70's.




One example that I really like, is that the roads were open for public during the practice sessions of the Targa Florio. So imagine you walking with your herd of sheep, when a Alfa Romeo T33/3 flies past doing about 150 mph. It's insane when you look at it.

A thing that I also like about the Targa, is the fact that most the works teams brought practice cars with them, but most of the private teams had to hire a car, a Gordini for example, and do the practice with that! The idea alone makes me LOL.

But anyway, I wanted to write a few posts about road racing, because it looks like nobody remembers this era of motor racing. Besides that, produced some legendary cars, most important ofcourse is the Ferrari 250 GTO.

Here are some pictures of the Mille Migla, which is still being driven today, but more in a sort of 'classic-roadtrip-timetrail-thingy'.

Everybody loves the Iso Isetta

Some La Carrera PanAmerica photo's:

One thing I love about the Pan-Am races, is the huge American made cars taking part. Really cool to see those being tuned and racing. Lot of European cars took part as well, Ferrari with the 340, Mini's Volvo's, Merc's, etc. All there to promote their cars in the US and in Mexico.

Last but not least, some Targa Florio pics:

Ofcourse, there are tracks that I didn't name. La Sarthe, Reims, etc, Europe alone is littered with tracks and roads that once were temples of speed. It's not very hard to do some research on this to be honest, there are a lot of websites who name nearly all the tracks and roadcourses.

Next post will be about the early era of motor racing. the early 1900's.