[alfa] Re: Voiturettes and Russian steel

[George Graves <gmgraves@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I'm not sure of the chicken-and-egg relationship here, but in Alfa's 
case, the 158 "Alfetta" definitely started life in Scuderia Ferrari's 
Modena shop as a Voiturette racer in the waning days before WWII. When 
the war was over, the FIA (or their then equivalent) was anxious to 
start-up racing again. Now, did they settle upon 1500cc's blown and 
3-liters unblown for the formula arbitrarily or because several 
Alfettas survived the war to form a nucleus around which to rebuild the 
sport? This I don't know.

BTW, the story about how the 158s survived the war is as fascinating as 
the 158's themselves. It seems that literally as the German Gestapo was 
walking up the front steps of the Alfa Romeo works at Monza park 
outside of Milan, Wilfredo Ricart (a brilliant and somewhat eccentric 
Spanish engineer who would, after WWII, be responsible for the fabulous 
Spanish Pegaso automobiles) and Gioacchino Columbo (who would go on to 
design the Famous Ferrari V-12) were driving vans loaded with 158's and 
spares out of the back of the factory. They made their way to the 
lovely town of Melzo to the north and east of the city where Ricart had 
arranged to store the cars and their spares in a disused part of a 
cheese factory. The cars and parts were walled-into one end of a large 
building which had no windows on that wall. The fresh wall made the 
building 'appear' considerably smaller on the inside than it was on the 
outside, but when the Germans, on a tip, searched the cheese factory 
premises, they failed to notice. After the war, the cars were 
un-walled, taken back to the now bombed-out (by the US 484th Bomber 
Group) Monza works and readied for the first tentative races. Thus it 
was that Alfa was just about the only major European manufacturer ready 
to go racing again when hostilities ceased.

George Graves
'86 GTV-6


On Jan 11, 2004, at 8:58 AM, alfa-digest wrote:


> Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2004 09:03:15 +0930
> From: "Paul Bayly" <thebaylys@domain.elided>
> Subject: Re: [alfa] Re: alfa-digest V9 #1070  Voiturettes and Russian 
> steel
>
> George,  I believe the vehicle types used in 'Voiturette' classes pre 
> 1950
> eventually evolved into F1/GP cars.  Or more correctly, the GP formula
> changed over the decade so as to end up similar to the earlier 
> 'Voiturette'
> formula.  Manufacturers having successful voiturette cars needed less
> development time to become competitive in GP racing, with the 
> dinosaurs for
> the most part being left behind.  The change to Avgas fuels and rear 
> engines
> of course changed GP racing forever.
>
> Beatle
> Oz
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