The race of his life

Nürburgring, Germany. August 4th, 1957. F1 German Grand Prix, 6th race of the season.

The Nordschleife: a legendary, beautiful and dangerous circuit near 23km long which, years later, would be baptised as "The Green Hell" (Grüne Hölle in German) by Jackie Stewart, because of being located in the middle, and across a lush forest.

The race is about to start, and on pole position there is the number 1 red Maserati with a yellow strip on the nose. At the wheel, Juan Manuel Fangio, Argentinean, 4 times world champion at that time (1952, 1954, 1955, 1956). He still does not know, but he is about to write one of the most beautiful pages in the history of Formula 1 and motorsports.

Despite his priviledged position at the starting grid, Fangio knew that his Maserati was not as fast as the powerful Ferraris (nonetheless, he had driven and won the world championship in the previous season driving a D50 model for the Scuderia of the prancing horse). Ferrari used Englebert tyres whith a harder compound that would let their cars to run the full distance without need of pitstops, whereas Maserati used Pirelli tyres, which were a softer compound. This would likely mean a higher speed in bends, but on the other hand, the wear for the tires was also higher, making very unlikely that Fangio would be able to finish the race without changing the tyres.

Bearing that in mind, Fangio started the race knowing that he must get a gap around 30 seconds over the rest of the pack in order to be able to battle for the race win. The race started and both Ferraris took command of the race, but Fangio would not last in taking over them and recovering the lead. After that, Fangio seemed rocketted to the victory, as he increased his pace and beat his own lap record no less than 6 times! He was on fire and reached the middle of the race with almost the theoretical 30 seconds he needed to contend the race victory...

...but the pitstop was drammatic: the mechanics changed the tyres in 1 minute and 18 seconds. There were different times! Fangio pitted out and he found himself nearly one minute off the pace of the lead. The race for him was over... over?

Against all the logic, Fangio challenged the fate and stormed the circuit from that moment and on. On his first lap after the pitstop, he faced a point over a blind hill; he did not hesitate and tried to go through it absolutely flat-out: his car took off the ground with the four wheels, but amazingly landed again, saving nearly 2 seconds in the maneouvre! The trick automatically granted him cutting the gap to the race lead drastically in each lap to go. When he beat again his own lap record by 8 seconds, the crowd attending the circuit realised that they were witnesses of a historical race and the most masterful drive they had ever seen.

Fangio went on to reach and pass first the Ferrari driven by Collins, and then the one driven by Hawthorn. With only 2 laps to go, Fangio overtook the latter and took over the race. Shortly afterwards, and 3 hours and 30 minutes after the start, Fangio crosses the finish line smiling, taking the victory, clinching his 5th world championship in style and becoming an even greater legend. The feat was achieved.

At the age of 46 years, Juan Manuel Fangio had carried out one of the most remarkable and greatest drives ever (if not the best). He had reached the pinnacle of motorsports with the race of his life.

It's a small world

Or, as I was going to write, it's a slot world.

It was briefly mentioned in the kick-off entry that one important and special part of this blog would be the wonderful world of slot car racing. I am sure you know it: I am refering to those small but detailed scale cars that run on plastic tracks with metallic rails in the middle to guide them (thus, the slot). You plug a controller to the track, and the electricity magic makes the car to move. So simple, so beautiful. I use to say that it is the only toy that people of all ages and also both genders like (however, a friend of mine corrected my view by poining out that puzzles also are, and I agree).

When I was a child, a Scalextric set was something that almost every kid had to receive as a Cristmas present at any time during his or her childhood (however, nowadays Scalextric is no longer the only available manufacturer, yet it keeps being recognised as the most popular brand). The most typical slot track was 8-shaped, but there were a wide variety of sets from the basic 0-shape to massive 4-lane circuits.

My first Scalextric set (made in Spain by Exin) was called 'Silverstone' and it was released in 1991. It had shape of glasses and included two Ferrari F1-87 cars (one of them being green!) that I still keep alive and kicking; unfortunately, I cannot say the same thing about the tracks, which got lost during a move along with a few more cars and pieces.

I was away from this slot small world for a few years until it came back with strength some 10 years ago. It just felt like a reunion with an old friend that you did not see for a long period. But this time, it will not leave again: it is here to stay.