One important historical event of Belgrade, which unfortunatelly is
very unknown to the Belgraders, is the Belgrade Grand Prix that took
place in 3 September 1939. At that time, the Grand Prix races were
what in modern times is Formula 1, actually Formula 1 came out of the
Grand Prix and this event could be interesting for Formula 1 fans. The
races were taking places in the worlds most prestigious places such as
Milan, Monaco, Bern, etc. and the fact that the same race took also
place in Belgrade is of great significance for the city itself.
The Belgrade Grand Prix race took place unfortunatelly only once.
However, it was unique in most of its components. Ironically, on the
same day when the race took place, 3 September 1939, France and
Britain have declared war on Nazi Germany as a reaction to Hitler’s
invasion to Poland, thus making the Belgrade Grand Prix the only one
that took place in the period of the war and the last race in the
pre-WWII period. Another unique thing of this race was that the winner
of the race, Tazio Nuvolari the great Italian racing legend, was his
last victory in his career. Also, the Belgrade track, one of the nine
tracks at that time, is along with the one of Monaco the only that is
until today preserved as it was 70 years ago, which could have a
turist significance.
The circuit was around Kalemegdan park, through Francuska street down
to the Belgrade Zoo, along the Danube coast and then turning the
street up crossing by the Saborna church. The whole length of the
circuit 2.79 km, with 50 laps. Up to the end of the race there was a
duel between Nuvolari and Manfred von Brauchitsch. At the end of the
race von Brauchitsch started spinning and handed over the victory to
Nuvalori and his team Auto-Union (what later became Audi). The only
Yugoslav driver was Bosko Milenkovic with a Bugatti that managed to
finish all 50 laps. The race was very popular among Belgrades and was
attended by 100.000 people, the quarter of Belgrades citizens. The
race itself was supported and sponsored by the young king Peter II and
the regent prince Paul.
Unfortunatelly, the communist regime did its best to erase this
significant event from the collective memory of the people for two
reasons. First, this event presented the King in a positive historical
light, concidering that the King was the ideological enemy of the
communist regime. The second reason was that the two winners of the
race were coming from Germany and Italy, both at that time Axis
powers. It appears that the communists have done their job perfectly
since extremelly few people actually know about this event. In my
research about this event I found very few facts about it. Especially
scarce are some sources that could tell us how the atmosphere was in
Belgrade and how its citizens perceived this event.
One brave attempt to make the people aware of this important
historical event for Belgrade was the projection that took place 17
April 2006 of a documentary by Dinko Tucakovic called “The forgotten
Grand Prix”. Hopefully this documentary will make people remember this
significant event in Belgrades history.
Further reading:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgrade_Grand_Prix
http://www.mtsmondo.com/entertainment/movies/story.php?vest=13725
http://www.ddavid.com/formula1/track.htm
http://themotorsportgallery.co.uk/mg-end_of_an_era.htm
{ 3 trackbacks }
{ 0 comments… add one now }