FELICE NAZZARO AND TAZIO NUVOLARI. NAZZARO WAS THE WORLD’S FIRST STYLIST OF THE WHEEL, ALONG WITH VINCENZO LANCIA. THESE TWO TAUGHT THE WORLD HOW TO RACE A CAR AT SPEED.
Where Nazzaro was precision and patience, Nuvolari is adventurous and brave, fire and guts: Where Lancia was impetuous and free-spirited, Varzi is disciplined and organized, shrewd and precise. Varzi, like Nazzaro, is the consummate professional. To see him drive is to witness the fluidity between man and machine that is a seamless metaphor of modernity. His method emboldens the future—scientific, methodical, devoid of emotion, focused solely on the result. Behind the wheel he is calmness personified, never phased, never rushed, always smooth, always soft. On comparing him to others—such as the highly-rated Italo-German, Rudi Caracciola—one almost expects Varzi to be the slower; and yet there exist few challengers to Varzi’s dominance of the international racing scene. It is testament to his supreme ability that, despite being a consistent winner of grands prix since his debut in 1928, he has never suffered a serious ‘off’. One sometimes wonders what kind of pace he would be capable of should he abandon his vigilance and give speed its head. But such thinking for Varzi is irrational, anathema—what need to challenge one’s mortality when one can compete—triumph—safely within one’s spirit?
Where Achille Varzi is technique, Tazio Nuvolari remains—being his natural antithesis—pure reaction. The survivor of multiple shunts that would have seen a man of lesser providence dead (and a man of lesser fortitude retired), he has developed a tail-happy style in the tradition of Vincenzo Lancia and yet uniquely his own: His furious drifts allied to a consistently attacking demeanor does not capture, it is true, the spirit of the modern, but neither does it reflect back to the past despite his firm Catholic belief and traditional way of life: He is a force of nature, fearless and committed, a metaphor not of modernity, but of modern Italy.
We have much to look forward to then as the grand prix circus begins its familiar tour of Europe: The Mille Miglia early in the spring (won this year by Nuvolari over Varzi) followed by the Targa Florio, Monaco, Spa in July, the Nürburgring in the dog days of summer, and our own Italian Grand Prix at Monza in the early autumn (while not forgetting the French Grand Prix slotted in somewhere between the summer or autumn, depending, as ever, on the whims of the Gallic disposition).
—-Excerpt from Tracks Racing the Sun
Where Nazzaro was precision and patience, Nuvolari is adventurous and brave, fire and guts: Where Lancia was impetuous and free-spirited, Varzi is disciplined and organized, shrewd and precise. Varzi, like Nazzaro, is the consummate professional. To see him drive is to witness the fluidity between man and machine that is a seamless metaphor of modernity. His method emboldens the future—scientific, methodical, devoid of emotion, focused solely on the result. Behind the wheel he is calmness personified, never phased, never rushed, always smooth, always soft. On comparing him to others—such as the highly-rated Italo-German, Rudi Caracciola—one almost expects Varzi to be the slower; and yet there exist few challengers to Varzi’s dominance of the international racing scene. It is testament to his supreme ability that, despite being a consistent winner of grands prix since his debut in 1928, he has never suffered a serious ‘off’. One sometimes wonders what kind of pace he would be capable of should he abandon his vigilance and give speed its head. But such thinking for Varzi is irrational, anathema—what need to challenge one’s mortality when one can compete—triumph—safely within one’s spirit?
Where Achille Varzi is technique, Tazio Nuvolari remains—being his natural antithesis—pure reaction. The survivor of multiple shunts that would have seen a man of lesser providence dead (and a man of lesser fortitude retired), he has developed a tail-happy style in the tradition of Vincenzo Lancia and yet uniquely his own: His furious drifts allied to a consistently attacking demeanor does not capture, it is true, the spirit of the modern, but neither does it reflect back to the past despite his firm Catholic belief and traditional way of life: He is a force of nature, fearless and committed, a metaphor not of modernity, but of modern Italy.
We have much to look forward to then as the grand prix circus begins its familiar tour of Europe: The Mille Miglia early in the spring (won this year by Nuvolari over Varzi) followed by the Targa Florio, Monaco, Spa in July, the Nürburgring in the dog days of summer, and our own Italian Grand Prix at Monza in the early autumn (while not forgetting the French Grand Prix slotted in somewhere between the summer or autumn, depending, as ever, on the whims of the Gallic disposition).
—-Excerpt from Tracks Racing the Sun
