Driving the Mille Miglia

The event started in Brescia, always the historical base of the Mille Miglia, during the afternoon of June 13. Each car drove across a red-carpeted raised platform and was off (the arrivals in Rome, at the end of the second day, and in Brescia, at the end of the final day, also included driving across a red-carpeted raised platform). The contestants spent the first night in Cervia Milano Marittima, on the Adriatic coast. The next night was in Rome, the third night in Parma, and the fourth night in Milan. The rally concluded mid-day back in Brescia. The first and last days were, therefore, half days, and in between were three very full days. Rome to Parma lasted sixteen hours, over 600 kilometers. Cervia to Rome was the second longest day, and much of it took place in the rain.

Every morning the cars started in numerical order with each starter spaced half a minute apart. As a result, our start was about two hours after the first car’s start, and we would arrive—if all went according to plan—at that night’s destination also about two hours after the first car did. (This is why we so rarely saw any of the pre-war cars, except on the rare occasion when one had broken down or for some other reason fallen way behind.) On the first full day, for instance, the first car left Cervia at 6:50AM and should have arrived in Rome about 8:15PM. We left Cervia about 8:30AM and reached Rome after 10PM. Days were long, sleep was short, and meals eaten in a hurry! Our third night on the road was spent in Parma, where we arrived around midnight, in time to grab a quick bite at the hotel restaurant before hitting the sack for another short night’s sleep and early-morning wake-up. Only the last night on the road, in Milan, did we have time for a more leisurely dinner and more than five hours of sleep!

We had been warned, though. The day before the start, we overheard the private mechanic of one entrant explain that participants get little sleep but survive the entire event “on adrenalin.” Then, once returned to Brescia at the end, they crash big time. This was certainly our case.