Spa, Merzario: “Scandalous to assign points with just 2 laps”

“You find the term to translate so that you can put this thing in the newspaper as I defined it, this thing they did in Spa.” Arturo Merzario does not understand what happened yesterday. From Sardinia, where he is on vacation, and with a verve, if possible even higher than his very high standards, the driver of the 60s and 70s goes down hard. In his opinion the decision taken by the race direction was a serious mistake, tacky, unimaginable, which he however defined in an unimaginable way. much clearer, more colorful and … not publishable. “What has been done – says the Comasco – has no logic, in any sense. In my day, to get the points you had to have done at least 50% of the planned laps plus one “.

The scandal

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And that’s the point, not so much the choice of running or not. “If you do only two laps and what’s more behind the Safety car you don’t have to assign points. Doing so knows a lot of way to protect yourself … To be safe from sponsors, organizers and above all spectators in the stands. track, but certainly not to assign points: this is the scandal that half is enough. Do you mean that the race in Spa has been disputed and valid? Okay, but everyone remains at zero points. I would really like to know what they think about this thing Stefano Domenicali and “Le Petit Napoleon” Jean Todt “.

And anyway, it’s not just a question of bureaucracy. It is obvious that talking to someone like Merzario, one of those who went to the track when at the end of the race we counted and went home happy if the riders were all still there, means making a comparison between very different worlds and in many respects. incomparable. Arturo was there, in the most famous wet race in the history of racing cars: at Fuji, in 1976. In the epic epilogue of the championship that crowned James Hunt and marked the beginning of the Niki Lauda epic. Lauda, ​​in his Ferrari, was reigning world champion, less than three months earlier he had risked being burned at the stake at the Nürburgring, he had come out alive but partly disfigured, he had stunned the world by returning to racing and in the following years he would have won two more titles. He was a hero, but that day he proved to be human because he had the courage to be afraid. And it is this, most of all, that will leave him forever with the aura of immortal.

The costs of the satellite

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“Even that day – Merzario remembers – we waited a long time before leaving, about four hours. But there were so many aspects at stake, on all the costs of the satellite, which was a novelty. There was a meeting: they told us that there is none. it was nothing to do, that you had to leave, then everyone would do what they believed. Niki retired immediately, I don’t criticize him, I never did. In my opinion he did well. Forghieri asked him “What can we say that it broke ? ”And Niki replied:“ Nothing, let’s just say I didn’t feel it. ”Merzario, on the other hand, went on 23 laps under the flood:“ Then my Wolf Williams engine broke. breaking latest news: Hunt, third, was world champion, but Mario Andretti won the race, doubling everyone.

Impossible comparisons

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After all, Arturo made thousands of kilometers under water. “Also because at the time if you told the Great Old Man (Enzo Ferrari, ed) that you would not have raced because it was raining, he would have sent you to c …. e. And not just him, even Abarth, or those of Ford. Chris Amon and me. once in Brands Hatch we ran in the snow, not the rain. ” However, it is true that, said so, it would seem an unequal comparison between human types. But it is not true that then they were fearless heroes to be exalted in comparison to today’s pilots who might mistakenly look shaky. Comparisons are impossible for the simple reason that the cars are too different. Too fast, sensitive and low those of today to be compared to those with which Merzario and his contemporaries braved the rain. “It’s true – recognizes Arturo – but then at Spa they didn’t even have to leave the pits”.