Manuel Garriga
A track in which the pilots overcame steep slopes, they noticed how their hearts sank when they jumped in the change of slope and they gambled their lives tracing a few centimeters from the trees and streetlights; on angle turns and The Rose Garden they passed so close that the public could see their faces and comment on their expression of joy, fear, concentration, anger ...
In this scenario, races of the Penya Rhin were held, including several classic Grand Prix, tests of passenger cars mixed with sports cars after (and even during) the Civil War, of Formulas 1, 2 and 3 -with the Brabham, Lotus, Matra, Tyrrell, etc-, of the Seat 600 and R-8 TS of the popular promotional cups, and naturally the 24 Hours of endurance and all the Grand Prix of the World Speed Championship until 1975 in the motorcycling field. It would be useless to list them when their history is collected by the scholar Javier del Arco in two monumental volumes dedicated to two and four wheels, published by the RACC and the Fundació Can Costa, work summa cum laude from the master of motor journalists and a must-read for anyone interested in the subject.
Thirty-six years ago the roar of engines ceased to be part of Montjuïc's soundscape. And although each summer the motorcycles reigned in the Park for the 24 Hours -suspended permanently in 1986 after the fatal accident of the pilot Mingo Parés-, the circuit was a closed chapter for motorsports since the mourning Grand Prix of 1975, which left a balance of five dead and a dozen injured. But despite the time that has passed, the magic of the Park has remained linked to the memory of the public since it began its activity in 1932 with a preliminary motorcycle test. The idea of creating it had arisen the previous year when the German rider Rudolf Caracciola, visiting Barcelona, suggested using the urban roads that wound around it to draw a circuit, just as they had done two years before in Monaco for their first Grand Prix.
You run like a Nuvolari
In a city that has just celebrated its second Universal Exhibition - for which it had already developed a large part of the mountain - the proposal does not fall on deaf ears and the authorities are enthusiastic: say i fet (said and done), the new track was officially inaugurated in June 1933, and in its early days the great figures will parade through it: Achille Varzi, Louis Chiron, Luigi Fagioli, Bernd Rosemeyer, Jean-Pierre Wimille, Tazio Nuvolari ... The extremely close victory, on June 7, 1936, of the Mantovano Volante, who crossed the finish line with his Alfa Romeo 12C just 2 seconds ahead of Caracciola's Mercedes-Benz, lifted an excited audience from their seats and left such a mark that the expression "This one runs like a Nuvolari" it will be incorporated into popular language to designate someone who drives very very fast.
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They were times of modernity, illusion and progress, but also - precisely because of this - pregnant with conflict. The poet Josep Maria López Picó, who had witnessed the Italian's triumph, evokes “An extraordinary and well-disciplined crowd. It seems incredible that it is the same people as the political and social extremists that afflict us. It should be said that Alfa Romeo always enjoyed a good poster in the park: an 8C 2600 Monza had won the inaugural test driven by the Chilean Juan Zanelli and with a P3 Varzi won the following year, when the Nacional-Pescara built in the Barcelona street Badal by the Pateras brothers. Mercedes could only break its hegemony with the triumph of Fagioli in 1935.
After the Civil War, the Grand Prix moved to the new Pedralbes circuit between 1946 and 1954, where the Argentine Juan Manuel Fangio was proclaimed world champion for the first time (and when repeating the title five times the local jargon would coin the phrase «You are made a fangio»). Meanwhile, all kinds of competitions take place in Montjuïc, from sports races to rally stages, passing through the disputed Nuvolari Cup. But not everything was elite competition. If the circuit was popular, it is because more modest vehicles ran there and therefore within reach of a greater number of pilots. The appearance of the first Seats contributes to this, which will also have sporting consequences filling the grills of passenger cars 1400 and soon 600 more or less prepared next to the Citroën, Renault, Fiat, Saab, etc. Starting in 1963, the new Juan Jover Trophy will begin to attract the best GTs: AC Cobra, Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin, Austin-Healey, Jaguar, Lotus, Mercedes, Porsche ... The Club 600 will organize endurance tests that will score for the European championship , and even the Tour de France Auto will include a stage in Barcelona.
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Pilot school
The epic of this track goes a long way. It is said that, due to its configuration, it was possible to do “impossible” races. The fast vehicles had all the climb and the top straight to unleash their potential -with the impressive jump of the stadium, the most launched-, and in the downward eses and the complicated turns prior to the bottom straight the slight (if their driver was right-handed) they could regain ground, leading to exciting duels. The Catalan drivers learned what it was like to race on a real circuit in the same place where the people of the city went for a walk on Sunday. Men like Paco Godia, who with the most different cars (Delahaye 135, AC Cobra 427, Renault Dauphine) won more races than anyone else and for a longer time; Paco Bultó also competed with his two Porsche 356s (which by the way had the same license plate), the ace from Sabadell Juan Fernández, often on a sport-class Porsche; José María Juncadella in the green and yellow Chevron boat sponsored by Tergal de la Escudería Montjuïc; Àlex Soler-Roig, before trying his luck in Formula 1; and also Paco Josa, Jose María Palomo, Jordi Babler, Jean-Claude, Salvador Cañellas ...
In 1969 Montjuïc once again hosted Formula 1, alternating with the brand new Jarama track as the venue for the Spanish Grand Prix. There are only four editions -for eleven in Madrid- but they are massively followed by an eager public for quality motorsport. So we can see legendary cars for many of us - like the Tyrrell 003 winner of 1971 with Jackie Stewart, the Lotus 72D that won the test in 1973 driven by Emerson Fittipaldi, or the McLaren M23 of Jochen Mass, first of the accident Grand Prix of 1975- and we started daydreaming. The Scotsman wins three times, his compatriot Jim Clark triumphs in his style -in the lead from start to finish-, with a fast lap included in the 2 F-1967 test, and the Englishman Derek Bell and the Swede Ronnie Peterson hold a bitter tête-à-tête staff of almost five hours in an endurance test of sport prototypes, the 1000 Kilometers from Barcelona of 1971.
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contesting the II Nuvolari Trophy, on April 6, 1957 (Author archive)
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But racing also captures the attention of a certain elite. The ineffable promoter Oriol Regàs puts the logo of his nightclub Boccaccio -the most fashionable place in the city- on the Piers Courage car, while the filmmakers Joaquín Jordà and Jacinto Esteva set scenes from the film on the circuit Dante is not only severe, produced by Ricardo Bofill, and the cartoonist Enric Sió places some episodes of his comic El Gholó at the 1968 Spanish Grand Prix. Figures such as Jackie Stewart, Emerson Fittipaldi, Clay Regazzoni, Jacky Ickx or Niki Lauda are invited by Paco Bultó to his farm in Cunit, to a festive private trial -each one has a Bultaco Sherpa waiting for him there, with his name on the plate- and they stroll down the Ramblas wearing corduroy caps and long sideburns. Speaking of fashion, the Scottish pilot, one of the first to use his personal image for advertising purposes, is portrayed in 1971 by the photographer Leopoldo Pomés for the campaign of a well-known brand of briefs.
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My first time
For obvious chronological reasons, the second stage of splendor of the Park is remembered by a greater number of people, among them this chronicler, who at the age of twelve took the train from Sabadell with a little friend to go see, both very proud, his first Grand Prix. Formula 1 and the last disputed in Montjuïc (which was not the cause of any childhood trauma, I clarify, perhaps the opposite), one of the most controversial, chaotic and dramatic in history. Given my short understandings at the time, I consider it prudent to give the floor to veteran photographer Josep Maria Alegre, who recounts it on his blog:
[su_quote] «During the first stop after the start there was a huge crash. Andretti pushed Lauda, who, losing control of his vehicle, crashed into his teammate, Regazzoni; Watson miraculously managed to avoid the Ferrari; Depailler, who noticed behind Watson, was unlucky and had to quit with a broken suspension. A little later, Andretti and Hunt, who had taken over, were forced to retire and Stommelen found himself at the helm of a Grand Prix for the first time in his life with Pace and Peterson at his wheel. Unfortunately, on lap 26, the German's car lost its rear wing: it crashed first against the guardrails on the left, then took flight across the track before finding itself on top of the guardrails on the right and crashing into the fence of protection. Stommelen left with several fractures and concussions, but four people trapped between the guardrail and the fence (two journalists and two firefighters) were killed due to the impact while a dozen were injured by the remains of the car (one of them would die days later) . » [/ su_quote]
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[su_quote] «During training the riders had complained about safety, guardrails loose or without bolts, asphalt in poor condition, etc. and threatened not to run. The organization counterattacked threatening the teams to keep the cars withheld for breach of contract. In the end, the race was held, although Fittipaldi did only a few laps at low speed, retired and left the venue. (…) It should be said, however, that the lack of security reported by the pilots had nothing to do with the tragedy. During the race there was also an accident in the Teatre Grec area on lap 4 between Jody Scheckter and others, which formed a plug and a large oil stain on the track and he, Alan Jones and Mark Donohue had to withdraw. Three laps later, James Hunt skates on the oil and crashes into the fences. At that time I was in that place, since I was the official (film) camera of the test. " [/ su_quote]
A circuit ... unsafe?
Despite the suspension of the F-1 tests, in which fatality, laziness, intransigence and other factors outweighed safety itself, Montjuïc was so embedded in the sporting and social life of Barcelona that it already it had become one more element of the family environment. Certainly, on few circuits in the world except the Nürburgring, Monaco and Le Mans, you can ride your vehicle on Monday on the same asphalt that cars or racing motorcycles used the day before. Not a few fans have their personal and secret stories of forays into the Park, with solo butt laps, spades incredible and even distressing escapes from the vehicles of the Urban Guard, always with deep night-time - it could not be otherwise - and that clandestine emotion of doing something as prohibited as desired.
at the wheel of his 600 with Abarth preparation (Author archive)
So far we have stuck to cars but we cannot forget motorcycles. In Catalonia, Montjuïc was as sacred a mountain for motorcyclists as Montserrat for Catholics (although they could appear in both categories at the same time), especially when it came to the 24 hours. But this test did not begin until 1955. Before the war, local ace Fernando Aranda and British hero Stanley Woods had raced there, and then champions such as John Surtees on the MV Agusta and Mike Hailwood on the howling Honda 250 Six. But it was on March 19, 1959 when the first and expected sporting confrontation between Bultaco and Montesa took place in the XV Grand Prix of Montjuïc, a very intense race that culminated in the victory of Tei Elizalde and his Brío 110 by just half a wheel of difference. , on the same finish line, in front of the new Tralla 101 piloted by John Grace. The permanent war between the two brands had just begun and Montjuïc would be the scene of its greatest battles.
There he was 2nd - at 86 thousandths of Anschdeit and his Kreidler, to the delirium of the spectators - a young Josep Maria Busquets on the Derbi 50 in the 1962 Spanish Grand Prix, debut of the minimum class in the World Cup. The milestone of the first triumph in a World Championship Grand Prix for a Spanish rider with a Spanish motorcycle did not come until 1968: the rider was Salvador Cañellas, the machine a Bultaco TSS 125 and the same circuit that would see the three heroes race fallen from our motorcycle history, Ramon Torras, Santi Herrero and Víctor Palomo, the multi-time champion Ángel Nieto sentenced some of his titles in 50 and 125, and the Lord of the Mountain, Min Grau, prevail seven times in the 24 Hours. Montjuïc, myth and motorcycle. Much.
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The tough resistance
«Who was someone in the Barcelona motorcycling race or pretended to run 24 Hours; who dared with the Mountain never failed that second weekend in July; Whether it was at the time of departure, at midnight, at dawn or upon arrival, everyone went, motorcyclist or non-motorist, from the city »wrote veteran journalist Javier Herrero, remembered director of the magazine Motorcycling. Anyone who has ever been there knows what I mean. Environment, noise, color, no smell, many smells: gasoline, Castrol, burnt rubber, hot churros, orange blossom and other herbs, and a lot of people everywhere, sitting, lying down or going to a place to place hunting for the best place to see the bikes go by, either singing, dancing, laughing and sleeping in tents or under the stars with the roar of the engines echoing a few meters away. An ideal setting to use as a background in a movie like Luis J. Comerón did shooting Long July Night (1974), interesting thriller with Simón Andreu, Marisa Paredes and Eusebio Poncela, in the 1973 edition
The brand that won them achieved great repercussion among the public. Ducati is making a strong foothold in the Spanish market and its prestige is forged in part thanks to the successes in Montjuïc: its twelve victories make it the most successful in the event, and the 250 24 Hours model created by Mototrans in Barcelona is even exported to England. Although another Italian firm was going to baptize a motorcycle with the magic name - Laverda called his 500 twin-cylinder 1978 Montjuïc - curiously, it would never be applied to any widely used Spanish model. Montesa planned to give it to her new 175 in 1962 but the media coverage of Operation Impala advised against it, and thus Bultaco was able to apply it to the expected successor to Shrapnel, presented in 1975, which never exceeded the prototype stage. The two rivals fought on the layout of the Park, with a third in disagreement -Ossa- who only won once (1967) but was about to do it many more. Those from Sant Adrià del Besós achieved it twice (1969 and 1972) although their Metralla 250 kit America was the motorcycle most used by privateers; those of Esplugues del Llobregat would take the palm with four absolute victories (1955, 1956, 1963 and 1966).
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Bordoy-Aschl (33), From Spain-From Spain (32) (Author archive)
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In the 70s, the predominance of 2Ts less than half a liter lost strength, the multi-cylinder 4Ts with greater cubic capacity and Japanese manufacture increased, competing with the European ones greater than half a liter. The test is already scoring for the World Endurance Championship (TT-1 and TT-2) and summons renowned figures attracted by the challenge of a complicated circuit: almost 4 km (3.790 m) of descents and ascents (90 m of unevenness between the highest point and the lowest point), few straight and short (400 m for the grandstand), curves of all imaginable radii between trees and buildings and with its specific name: Font del Gat, Pergola, Teatre Grec, Guardia Urbana ... A real ordeal for anyone racing there for the first time. The bravest (or masochists) repeated every year, as if they did not have enough, and they were the majority. But the party ended in 1986. The average speed had been increasing more and more and the circuit, despite the security measures, was still just as dangerous, perhaps more because the competition was so high and nobody gave up easily. The accident that took the life of Mingo Parés, a much loved rider and member of the great Barcelona biker family that had helped to lift the 24 Hours race three decades ago, was too much: the next edition did not take place and the park was definitively Mute.
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Put the batteries on once
For some time there has been a movement promoted by a growing group of fans to ensure that Montjuïc does not remain a mere memory. What this place means for the people of Barcelona and for the Catalans in general, has to do with a feeling of identity - as respectable as any other -, of attachment to one's own self, and of being embedded in the collective memory of several generations. And I'm not just talking about races, motors or runners, because talking about Montjuïc is, as Javier del Arco explains, doing it too,
[su_quote] «of the Magic Fountains and their surroundings designed by the engineer Carles Bohigas -which left the visitors to the 1929 International Exhibition astonished-, or of the Palaces that the architect Josep Puig i Cadafalch conceived so that, built to In order to host a contest that was going to last a few months, they were still standing and as slender as ever more than eighty years later, or of the Gardens that the urban planner Nicolau Rubió i Tudurí designed to beautify the sea side of the mountain, not exactly enhanced in its beauty for a gigantic necropolis, or the Teatre Grec, symbol, together with the Ethnological Museum, of the local culture, to which decades later the Fundació Miró and the CaixaForum would be added ... not to mention the military castle that during 300 For years he has watched over the city and its port from the top. " [/ su_quote]
What this initiative aims to do is something as ambitious and at the same time as simple as recovering the old restaurant The Pergola, located on the curve that gives it its name, to make it the nerve center and social headquarters of Montjuïc's sports memory. This huge premises, closed for years, could house a small museum and an exhibition hall, with a bookstore and gift shop, a restaurant and a cafeteria, perhaps a modest auditorium and, why not, some rooms where entities could accommodate related to this topic. Such a place would be the meeting point for fans, pilots, journalists and researchers; but above all, it should attract tourists, and the more the better, since they are the basis of the business (such a scam, the reader is fooled, it can only work with profitability criteria). If Barcelona has one of the axes of its economy in tourism, I still do not explain to myself why it has not yet exploited its potential as an inescapable reference in the field of historical motoring, as Monza in Italy, Brooklands in England, the Nürburgring in Germany and Indianapolis do. in the US Are we stupid or what?
Phenomena like martini legends, which on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the circuit attracted more than 2007 people in 200.000 -for which the control center had to be placed in a mechanotube structure erected in front of the empty building of La Pérgola-, or the recent Barcelona Montjuic Revival, whose development we already dealt with in the corresponding chronicle, demonstrates our ability to organize an event of international level. And in a mountain integrated into the urban fabric that has half a dozen sports facilities and various museums, theaters, monuments, gardens, historical buildings, as well as a cemetery, a cable car and a telecommunications tower, and which has been recycled into a hotel in luxury the old TVE studios in Miramar are you sure there is no space for a center dedicated to the memory of the circuit and what it represented for the city and the country? Public authorities, administrations, federations, automobile clubs, lobbies, foundations, promoters, investors ... what are you waiting for? Do you realize the importance of this common heritage? How long will they stay in the clouds? Let each one play the role that corresponds to him, and leave that of Jiminy Cricket -or of Agent Provocateur- for those who only know how to put letters together.
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Photography | Antoni Bassó, Author Archive
Video | motor archeology, Tati tatinos
