Monday 18th May 2015

Mille Miglia 2015 - PH Liveblog

Caffeine, speed and the enthusiasm of the locals is keeping Matt going on the Mille

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Welcome to the PH Mille Miglia liveblog! Quite an opportunity that we're very keen to make the most of. Matt is following the route with Bentley in a Continental GT V8 (tough job, etc), including the opportunity to ride in the spectacular Blower Bentley you see above. On social media the accounts you need are @PistonHeads and @PHMattB on Twitter, plus @pistonheads_speedmatters and @mat_bird for when we're feeling arty with filters on Instagram. We'll hastag stuff #PHMM2015 as well. Which is all very technical.

Archived updates from the Mille Miglia liveblog can be found here. For the latest update see below!

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Saturday, 1400h
Given how little sleep everyone on the Mille Miglia is having, we are still very much awake. Oh yes sir. The coffee will have something to do with it - it's potent alright - but what you witness on the roads does an even better job of keeping eyes extremely wide open.

Regularity event? Balderdash. Drivers are racing, and racing hard. Have you even been undertaken and overtaken at the same time? In stationary traffic? Me neither. That's certainly an event, especially when the cars are worth millions.

Obviously many people have discussed the, shall we say, enthusiastic driving on the Mille previously but it must be experienced to be believed. Truly it's shocking. Sometimes in an exciting way, often in a terrifying way. The audacity of some overtakes beggars belief, the speed through urban areas is wild and country roads are stages to many a flat out race.

And yet it all somehow sort of works. A lot of the behaviour can't be condoned but as pretty much everyone embraces it there's some kind of chaotic rhythm. When you see regular drivers moving aside to make another lane it all starts to make sense. When police motorbikes escort you through towns, halting traffic and charging through red lights, the influence of the Mille Miglia on this part of Italy becomes clear.

Furthermore, as mentioned previously, the public enthusiasm around the driving is huge. And infectious too. There have been standing starts in villages, screeching across roundabouts and thunderous passes on main roads. All of it lapped up and encouraged with waves and cheers. You are never, ever going fast enough for the Italians either.

If this sounds like a recipe for disaster from the outside that wouldn't be surprising. But somehow the Mille Miglia makes the lunacy work and it's an absolutely magnificent occasion. Only in Italy!

Matt

[sjabrown]

Thoroughly enjoyed watching the field go up the hairpins near the castle today. So many beautiful cars, beautiful sounds and smells.

[sjabrown]

riosyd said:

I found this photo of them on Instagram

They're top chaps. Staying at the same hotel in Brescia. Car looks and sounds wonderful. I've a few photos I'll send on when home (in a week or so)

steven