{"id":66801,"date":"2021-04-08T02:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-04-08T02:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.secret-classics.com\/?p=66801"},"modified":"2021-04-22T06:41:52","modified_gmt":"2021-04-22T06:41:52","slug":"mille-miglia-1931","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.secret-classics.com\/en\/mille-miglia-1931\/","title":{"rendered":"Mille Miglia 1931"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Mille Miglia in Italy is best known among car fans to this day. All the most famous racing drivers of their era used to compete against each other on a route length of around 1,000 miles. This event existed from 1927 to 1957. Nowadays, since its rebirth in 1977, it is officially a regularity rally for classic cars. However, connoisseurs know that the Italian organizers are sometimes very tight on the times to be kept and thus the classics must be driven quite fast as well. At this point, however, we are deliberately going back 90 years. In 1931, the fifth edition of the Mille Miglia took place between April 13 and 16.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Very fast Tour of Italy<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

A total of 151 teams had entered their names in the starting list. As always, they were to take to the track at one-minute intervals. This year, the route covered 1,635 kilometers from Brescia to Parma and Bologna. Then they passed through Florence, Siena, Rome, Perugia and Macerata as well as Rimini, Bologna again and then Verona on their way to the finish back in Brescia. Many vehicles and teams were from Italy and deliberately used their knowledge of the route. Spare parts, tires and fuel depots had been set up along the streets. Mercedes-Benz under race director Alfred Neubauer, on the other hand, had to economize and had set up a total of only four depots. The driver pairing of Rudolf Caracciola and Wilhelm Sebastian did compete with a brand new Mercedes-Benz SSKL of the W06RS series, but officially only as a private team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mercedes withdrew from racing after Black Friday<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The reason for this was already two years in the past. Due to the stock market crash in the USA in 1929, the global economy suffered. In Germany, vehicle production figures fell from 139,869 units in 1929 to 64,377 in 1931, and Daimler-Benz AG sales fell in a similar proportion. As a result, the Board of Management halted the factory motorsport program for cost reasons, even thought the company was currently on a winning streak. Works driver Rudolf Caracciola was given notice, but was kept on board by race director Alfred Neubauer through minor works support and the provision of a brandnew SSKL. Despite a reduction to only eleven racing events in 1931, the track record reads more than impressive. Caracciola won all eleven races and defended his title as European Hillclimb Champion.<\/p>\n\n\n

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