[Jamie]

Monza (Warning: Large image)

I always had this dream to re enact the scene from 'Grand Prix' you know the part where the cars are racing flat out around the banking of Monza. The trouble was with the 1/32 scale cars they tended to reproduce the part where the car trips up on the exhaust...

Since the advent of Magnet cars, I kind of miss the old banked track.

Jamie

 

[Fergy]

Jamie, every time I watch a race from Monza, I think about that old oval! I think most of it has now deteriorated to a rather sad degree, but it's nice to see a pic that clearly shows where the original oval course was. Thanks for the pic!

 

[Cslotracer1]

wow! I had never seen an aerial pic of the banked monza!

 

[Fergy]

Now that you know where to look, you can catch occasional glimpses of it on televised races.

 

[nightglider1]

So....a bunch of us get together and build it on a 1:1 scale...?

 

[CoolScientist]

Awesome pic Jamie....

Although the Monza track history dates back to way back when... If I was to build a scale track of an old course it would be Brooklands...

I stood on the banking at Brooklands and sat in the timing pits in the wall beneath the footbridge... and could just imagine the cars blowing past... the place for me, oozed motor racing... and like Monza. I feel its a terrrible shame it ceases to exist as a race track...

The outline from the ariel view of the track as Monza is distinct.... and Im sure (possibly) that you could almost drive round it now... unlike Brooklands - which gave up most of itself to housing developments and a runway...

Stunning pic - thanks for moment

CoolS

 

[Fergy]

Sure, nightglider1!.... where do you live?

Seriously, though, I just love the history and I get a bit sad when I see something like the Monza GP and catch a glimpse of the old circuit on the TV cameras and yet there is no mention of it, as there was just a few short years ago.... almost as if the past doesn't matter anymore. It isn't just Monza - it happens everywhere. And it makes me sad whenever I come across an example of a track that has given way to "society" or "progress" without being preserved as it once was or even as I once knew it.... Monza, Riverside, or, one of the most profound, if lesser known, examples in North America.... Paramount Ranch!

Yeah, yeah.... I'm getting old!

In fact, though, Paramount Ranch was a circuit modelled in the 60's in a series of major slot magazine articles because it leant itself so well to slot racing! One example of a track modelled after Paramount Ranch is here.

 

[Stradale]

Great Picture Jamie, after catching glimpses on TV ,and seeing it flash by whilst playing Granp Prix Legends, it was good to see definitively where the banking was.

Do any of our historians know how the Banking was incorporated in a GP? Was it a lap around the road course,then a lap on the banking? How did they do it?

I had a look on Dennis David's excellent site,thinking that info may have been hidden there, but did not find it.

regards
Ken

 

[Threeracers]

Great photo.

The best resource for circuits and their history;

http://www.racingcircuits.net/

The site can be a little slow although it worked when I checked a moment ago. If you click on Monza it shows how the circuit developed over the years. It used to me once round each part.

Regards

Mark

 

[Jamie]

Hi Ken

One lap consisted of the racing cars touring past the pits twice if that makes sense. For the first half of the lap they drove the road course and for the second part of the same lap, they drove the banked oval, so each competitor drove past the pits twice, hence Monza has such a wide start/finish straight. Mainly because it was originally two straights running parallel.

A couple more links on Monza:

www.monzasport.it (loads of goodies on this site including video, sounds etc)

Monza Banking Photo's

Best regards all,

Jamie