|
|
Post by mikael on Mar 3, 2018 5:36:43 GMT
Regarding de Portago and Nelson:
It's interesting that de Portago was also a very talented bobsleigh runner, taking fourth place (only 0.16s away from the Bronze Medal) at the 1956 Olympics, and third place at the 1957 World Championships.
De Portago's co-driver/navigator at the 1957 Mille Miglia, the American Edmund Nelson, was in fact his bobsleigh coach, and the man who introduced de Portago to bobsledding.
(Source: Wikipedia)
By the way, looking at the Ferraris on this thread, I find it curious that they all have the steering wheel in the right side. In the 50's and 60's, Italy had right-hand drive just as they have now, isn't that true?
Does anyone know the background / an explanation for placing the steering wheel to the right?
I recall my father told me that his first car, a Lancia V4 from the 1940's - directly imported from Italy, also had right-side steering. And looking in Piero Taruffi's "The Techniques of Motor Racing", the standard road cars shown in that book all have right-side steering as well.
(For the pure racing cars, one can of course think about that most racing tracks are made to run clockwise; hence sitting on the right side, it might be a bit easier to see the clipping points. But again, I have the impression that right-side steering was common also by Italian road cars.)
--------
Regarding left-hand / right-hand drive: Sweden had left-hand drive until 1967, where it was changed to right-hand drive. Amazing that such a change was possible!
Japan has left-hand drive, just as the UK. A curious phenomenon is the popularity of cars with left-side steering. The apparent reason is that people like to "spell out" that they (can afford to) drive an imported car. Even British cars are typically ordered with left-side steering! (Last summer I happened to stay at a hotel in Tokyo which had a Rolls Royce dealership as neighbor. All the displayed Rolls Royces had left-side steering!!)
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Mar 3, 2018 9:14:59 GMT
I knew about Sweden switching sides in 1967. There is a very recent case in the Pacific, can't recall which (Fiji?), which few years ago switched back to LHT (left-hand traffic) because they import cars mainly from NZ or Oz, where they have LHT. I didn't know in Japan they consider it posh to have British cars set-up for RHT, quite strange and funny. From Wiki (that is all I know): Many urban buses and some trucks too currently have RHD (right-hand drive) in Italy, but of course they all drive in RHT!  |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Mar 3, 2018 9:18:04 GMT
Lucio, I am sure you have a better picture of that. Rene', it's one I found of that occasion with De Portago, seen in profile. De Portago was fourth at Rome check point. |
|
|
|
Post by René on Mar 3, 2018 9:33:50 GMT
Lucio, I am sure you have a better picture of that. Rene', it's one I found of that occasion with De Portago, seen in profile. De Portago was fourth at Rome check point. Lucio, I am afraid my knowledge of the Englsih expression abandoned me here.  I was actually referring to the state of the passion for motor sport in Italy and questioning if this was still as broad as it used to be. And I thought you may know more about that. |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Mar 3, 2018 10:13:27 GMT
Oh, you were referring to your previous post. Cool. Good (and difficult) question. Keep in mind that it's twenty years I left Italy and many things have changed down there, particularly anthropology, the way people behave and think, I found it quite different from what I was used to. There is a big slice of Italian history between that picture of 1957 and today. 1957 was perhaps the first of the post-war economic boom Italy enjoyed (it lasted until around 1963), called " il miracolo economico". Cars, televisions sets, domestic appliances became widespread. Internal mass migration from the south to the industrial triangle in the north (Turin-Milan-Genoa) deeply affected and changed the country in those years. At the time there was no marketing or mass media campaigns that could direct the way people followed the sport. There were many local marques competing, local drivers still had relevance, the passion was genuine. Today, there is only Ferrari, as it is it's fundamentally a marketing construct - the way I see it - on the altar of which all Italian motorsport heritage has been burned down to the ground. There is nothing else left. Dallara is an industrial operation, very successful, but not more than that. The marketing, the mass media try to sell Ferrari as the " nazionale rossa", in parallel to the football's nazionale azzurra (the only one I recognize), but it's a forced identification, it has nothing of the genuinity of the passion on show on the picture Mikael posted. I just received the other day few books on the theme: "C'era una volta l'auto italiana. Da Leonardo da Vinci a Sergio Marchionne" www.amazon.it/gp/product/8897867294/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1"Alfa Romeo. La tela di Penepole" www.amazon.it/Penepole-disfatti-misfatti-%C2%ABmalasanit%C3%A0%C2%BB-industriale/dp/8888269371/ref=sr_1_11?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1520071366&sr=1-11&keywords=alfa+romeo"Autodelta. L'ala veloce dell'Alfa Romeo" www.amazon.it/gp/product/8888269568/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1The picture that results is desperate. You may take all the above with some grain of salt, as I am an old contrarian.  |
|
|
|
Post by René on Mar 3, 2018 10:48:32 GMT
You may take all the above with some grain of salt, as I am an old contrarian. Haha, nothing wrong with being a contrarian. I have the feeling you're not the only one on this forum! Thank you for your elaborate reply, very interesting. Although Italy for me is 'only' a holiday and Grand Prix destination, I have seen the change too. When talking motor sport and thinking back of my first vistit to Monza and Maranello in 1989 and comparing that with later visits, things have changed for sure. When we visited Maranello in 1989 after the Grand Prix, everything was still more authentic. There was no Galleria Ferrari yet, just a small display area at the entrance of the factory and there were a lot of small racing related garages and companies surrounding the factory. The whole area was breathing racing. That was definitively different compared to my last Maranello visit in 2004. Don't get me wrong, the Galleria is fantastic but the whole area was cleaned up, everything is Ferrari and very corporate. I would say I preferred the way it used to be so I am just glad I witnessed the tail end of that more romantic period in time. |
|
|
|
Post by mikael on Mar 3, 2018 13:19:46 GMT
Thanks a lot for the reply, Lucio; very interesting and senseful.
As to the disagreement about in which side of the road to drive (in the old days in Italy), I am reminded of somewhat similar points of disagreements here in Japan that were never resolved, although they're (luckily!) placed lower on the danger-scale. For example, the electricity providers have never been able to agree on what frequency to use for the AC power supply. From Tokyo and Northward (incuding Tokyo), it's 50 Hz; from Tokyo and Westward,it's 60 Hz. And in Tokyo, you stand on the left-hand side of the escalators, and walk on the right-hand side. In the Kansai area (Osaka, Kyoto, Kobe), it opposite: you stand still in the right-hand side and walk in the left-hand side.
As to the steering wheel position in racing (sports) cars, personally, when "having a go", alone and on deserted countryside road, and going through a turn as fast as I think I possibly can, I'm always most confident in turns to the opposite site of where I'm sitting, that is, turns to the left here in Japan, and turns to right in the old days back in Denmark. But of course, I'm not - and never were - a professional racing driver.
|
|
|
|
Post by René on Feb 10, 2024 20:05:04 GMT
… bumping an old thread… Rodriguez, Mairesse and Gendebien, winners in the 1962 Targa Florio.    |
|
