The last weekend in May is unique in Motor Racing terms in that it features two of the sports most legendary fixtures.
On Sunday, Monte Carlo will play host to the Monaco Grand Prix, the round-the-houses race that, for many, defines Grand prix racing both in the modern age and before.
At the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on the same day, thirty three cars will form the grid for the 91st running of the Indianapolis 500, another defining race, the jewel in the crown of the IRL series.
In many ways these two events go hand in hand as reminders of the deep and lustrous history of the sport of racing cars, but in others they could not be further removed from each other.
The ‘500’ – to give it the full original title ‘Indianapolis 500-mile Sweepstake’ – was first run in 1911 around the 2.5mile speedway, a vast circuit with four corners connected by four straights, not the oval it is often referred to. The winner that year was Harroun in a Mormon, and his average speed of just less than 75 miles per hour an astonishing feat to behold.
Over the next few years the speeds increased as such legends as Jules Goux (1913), Ralph de Palma (1915) and Dario Resta (1916) took the spoils, all in European machinery. By 1920, however, the field was dominated by American cars, and the race began to take on the legendary status it still holds among US motor racing aficionados.
By the time the Monaco Grand Prix was first run, in 1929, the winning Miller of Keech won at an average of 97.59mph (although not the fastest – that had been the Duesenberg of de Paolo in 1925, at 101.13mph), which gives us an interesting comparison in genre between the two disciplines.
The story of the Monaco race is well known – Anthony Noghes wanted a race to rival the great ‘Grands Prix’ of the day in his native Monaco, and devised an initially ridiculed circuit that went on to become a legend – and the winner of that 1929 race, William Grover-Williams, has been well chronicled too, but we are interested in comparison.
For, whilst the ‘Indy’ cars were achieving one hundred mile an hour laps by 1929, the average speed of Williams’ Bugatti was just less than 50mph.
It could be argued, however, that both provided spectacle in equal measures (and can still be argued to this day.)
Moving forward to the modern day for a moment, and let’s compare the relative aspects of the 500 and Monaco in simple terms.
The pole position lap (well, four of them in truth) for this year’s race came out at an average of 225.817mph, from Helio Castroneves. It is interesting indeed that Indianapolis qualifying positions are given in miles per hour, not time – speed is the essence at the Speedway.
As a comparison, the fastest, ultimate, speed reached on a lap of Monaco is likely to be around 175mph. The Indianapolis cars are lapping an average of 50mph quicker, then, than Monaco’s fastest point.
One might offer that that is all very well, for all a driver has to do at Indianapolis is keep his foot flat to the floor and keep away from the walls. It’s far from as simple as that, but again, the comparison is there: to win at Monaco one has to go as fast as possible, and keep away from the walls.
Precision is paramount at both venues. To hit a wall at Indianapolis at 225mph will undoubtedly end your race; to do so at 100mph at Monaco is likely to have the same result.
During the 1950s the Indianapolis 500 was included, rather oddly, as a round of the World Championship as was the Monaco Grand Prix. For example, in 1956 the two races ran a week apart, with Stirling Moss taking the spoils at Monaco at little under 65mph – not much different, if truth be told, from the 1929 speed. Pat Flaherty, who won the Indy race in a Watson Roadster, ran at an average of 128mph – a considerable increase on 30 years before.
Throughout the 1960’s the 500 was held in high esteem by the Grand Prix elite, with the likes of Jim Clark and Graham Hill both taking victories in 1965 and 1966 respectively for Lotus, but little interest was shown from the 1970’s on as the race became an exclusively US based affair. That Hill – ‘Mr Monaco’ to many – was one of the chosen is apt for our purpose.
The Indianapolis race has been an unfortunate victim of the absurd ‘war’ that tore US single seater racing down the middle some years ago, and many consider it a race of less importance than it should be. Dan Wheldon, in the interview with UpdateSport in this magazine, gives his view on the matter, and I tend to agree: any race that has among its competitors the likes of Michael Andretti, Tony Kanaan, Al Unser Jnr, Wheldon, Scott Dixon, Sam Hornish and others is deserving of attention.
Meanwhile, the Monaco Grand Prix continues to assert Formula One’s ‘prima donna’ status, with Hollywood stars and other celebrities parading in the pits, and the massive egos of Michael Schumacher, Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen, to mention but a few, stealing the limelight.
Both races deserve to be feted, to be preserved for our enjoyment and added to the long list of results that these two behemoths of the racing world can proclaim, and we must not forget that, although they may seem a world apart in terms of speed, participants, formula and personality, they remain two of the greatest contests of man and machine in existence today.
The Indianapolis 500, and the Monaco Grand Prix – long may they remain with us.
Written by Steve Turnbull on Wed, 23 May 2007 13:04:50
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