The Amateur Spirit

Papa Marzotto did not want his four boys to race. It was raining hard, the mountain roads were slick and treacherous, and there was word of snow in the passes. A veteran road-racer himself before he got too busy with his textile business, 55-year-old Father Marzotto knew about such things. But this race was the Mille Miglia, Italy's most important road contest for stock cars, and the Marzotto brothers were determined to drive their Ferraris in the big international field of 383 drivers, many of them Europe's top professionals. As it turned out, race day last week was a great day for the amateur Marzottos.

The watching crowds along the 1,000-mile course (Brescia to Rome and back) were almost as intense as the drivers. But wealthy Papa Marzotto (Count of Valdagno Castelvecchio), who had supplied the boys with the best in snappy motor cars, was so mad at his venturesome sons that he refused to go out to see the start of the race.

Death on the Road. At midnight, in a drenching rainstorm, the little Fiats were sent off first, then the larger cars--mostly powerful Italian Alfa Romeos and Ferraris and British Jaguars. The man to beat, the experts thought, was four-time winner Clemente Biondetti, a hard-bitten roadwise pro who drove a big Jaguar. No one gave Gianni, Vittorio, Paolo and Umberto Marzotto much of a chance.

The pace did prove too much for Umberto, 23. In the first half of the race he skidded off the road, wrapped his car around a pole, got out only superficially hurt. Other drivers had worse in store. Peter Richard Monkhouse's British Healey somersaulted into a field and he died in the crash; Alvasio Bassi was crushed to death when his car turned turtle in a sweeping skid on the slippery asphalt. Fatalities did not compare with 1938, when 23 spectators were killed when one racer skidded into a crowd (Mussolini banned the race the next year), but it was bloody enough.

Young Gianni Marzotto, 21, set off at a 100 m.p.h. clip, remembered passing brother Vittorio, 28, in the first hour. But he had little time for watching other drivers as he increased his speed, sometimes to 118, through the winding Apennines roads and finally thundered into Rome, the halfway mark. Enthusiastic Romans cheered and kissed him, told him he was in the lead and that Champion Biondetti's Jaguar had dropped out for emergency repairs. "For the first time I thought I might win," Gianni recalled later.

Playing It Safe. Waved off again, he bored back through incessant rain toward Florence. Between Florence and Bologna he struck snow and hail which slowed him down. At Bologna, brother Paolo, 19, who had been forced to quit when his brakes failed, begged Gianni, with his nine-minute lead, to play it safe. So, over the last 145 miles, Gianni held his Ferrari down to a conservative 105 m.p.h. on the straightaways until he saw the finish light in Brescia. Then he poured it on.

Thirteen and one-half hours after he started (average speed, 76 m.p.h.), Gianni climbed wearily out of his rakish speedster and waited for his brothers. The family did well: Gianni won and Vittorio was fifth. And Papa, after all, was pleased.

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