Letters from readers, February 2004

Can you MGB serious

Sir,

Your article on Mugello brought back to me one of the more intriguing episodes in my 40-year interest in motor racing.

In either 1965 or ’66, I was on holiday touring around Italy when, in the hills above Florence, we came across a hotel with the Ron Harris Team Lotus transporter parked in its driveway. As we had no accommodation arranged, I thought it would be interesting to spend a few days in a hotel with a racing team, rather than having to suffer the heat and crowds of midsummer Florence. I had never even heard of Mugello at the time, let alone knew about the circuit and the F3 race that would be run there that year. Anyway, we booked in and soon met the team and the drivers. They were all new to the circuit and the story they told us was as follows:

One of the drivers had timed an initial ‘blind’ lap of the circuit in the MGB he had driven to the event. They then did a more detailed inspection of the circuit, stopping at the various corners and taking note of the terrain. This made such a great impression on them that their fastest lap over the whole weekend was the initial one in the MGB, and not the ones in the Lotus.

I don’t know how close to the truth this story is, but your article gives it a degree of plausibility.

Many thanks for a great magazine, the best part of which is these Track Tests.

Edward Atkin, London