Monza-1960

[aeronca65t]

No, not the Corvair....... :wink:

Ever wonder why they said the old Monza race track was said to be so dangerous? This picture (below) of Richie Ginter's Ferrari in 1960 should explain. Imagine going "off"?!?!
This is the last year a front engine car won a GP (Phil Hill in a Ferrari, of course).

And since this part of the forum is supposed to be about British cars, let me point out that this is the year, that Ferrari is said to have colluded with the Italian officials so that their more powerful, front-engined Grand Prix cars had an advantage. By this time, many of the Brit cars had moved to mid-engined designs.

As a consequence, all the Brit teams quit the event including Cooper, BRM, Lotus, Rob Walker and BRP. Ferrari filled up the grid with privateer Ferraris plus a mid-engined "Cooper" which was really Ferrari powered (it was a test bed for their first mid-engine car). The "Cooper" finished fourth.

<span style="font-style: italic">Some of this content I gleaned from reading the very excellent historicracing.com website.</span>

 

[MadMarx]

Part of these banked curves at Monza do still exist.
Montherly also has banked curves, and the Avus track too.

Photos from Avus:

 

[Hap Waldrop]

I was at Monza this year for the F1 GP, sat outside at T1, and could see one of the bank turns from where I was sitting. Monza is a real cool palce to see a GP, lots of history, and the place is just cool, not the cement jungle most tracks in the US are, more like a big park, lots of trees and grass surrounding the place, and fairly easy race to attend, way easier than say than going to Charlotte for a Nasacar race. the concessions were kinda interesting, but good, just not your normal race track fare. I went with Formula Tours and stayed in Lake Como, which is a awesome area as well.