Silverphile by John Kuhn Bleimaier

The Unsung Diesel Drivers on the 1955 Mille Miglia

Photos by Marina Pushkareva

On May 1, 1955, two young Englishmen in a Silver Arrow achieved greatness in international motorsport. On that same day, and in that same race, two young Austrians achieved an equal, though less celebrated, feat, also driving an automobile built by Mercedes-Benz.

In the oft-told story of great skill and daring, driver Stirling Moss and navigator/journalist Denis Jenkinson drove a works 300SLR roadster flat out for a thousand miles over the back roads of Italy to win first place for Mercedes-Benz in the legendary Mille Miglia road race, posting an average speed a fraction under 100 mph. Moss went on to be knighted for a career characterized by conspicuous automotive gallantry. The 1955 Mille Miglia triumph arguably occupies the very pinnacle of his achievements.

In that same race, Helmut Retter and Wolfgang Larcher piloted a Mercedes 180 Diesel sedan to a class win, averaging 58.8 mph. While Moss and Jenkinson's overall victory was attained in a specially built, one-off alloy-bodied vehicle from the Daimler-Benz competition department, Retter and Larcher drove a stock, four-door saloon car serviced for the event by their local Mercedes-Benz dealer in Innsbruck. A 100-mph average speed on mountain passes and two-lane public roads across Italy in a race car is impressive indeed. Yet which superlative is adequate to describe maintaining a 60-mph average over the same course in a 1.8-liter displacement diesel sedan with a scant 40 horsepower?

Moss, Jenkinson, and the Mercedes competition department confirmed that the company was capable of fielding the fastest and most durable racing vehicle in the world. Simultaneously, Retter, Larcher, and the unsung assembly-line workers in Stuttgart proved that Mercedes built the finest production car in the world.

I have been driving Mercedes diesel vehicles since I practiced with my New Jersey learner's permit in my parents' 190Dc back in 1967. I can use the four-speed gearbox and play the compression-ignition torque curve on a steep incline. I have felt the satisfaction of quite literally smoking the opposition with a well-executed downshift. Folks who know me well have said that diesel fuel's low volatility yet slick properties are part of my character. Whatever. For me, Retter, Larcher, and their 180D are personal heroes.

Last spring after sailing with my Swiss cousin around the Bay of Naples and along the Amalfi Coast, I was struck with the idea of renting a car in Italy and retracing the route of the Mille Miglia.

Of course, the all-out Mille Miglia road race has not been held since 1957, when a Ferrari driven by Count Alfonso de Portago went off the road, killing the driver, the navigator, and nine spectators. However, since the mid-'80s there has been a classic-car rallye that runs the route of the Mille Miglia. I have witnessed the passage of the vintage cars from the southern shore of Lago di Garda on a couple of occasions. Now I determined to challenge the Futa and Raticosa passes on my own and to blast along the quiet back roads of Tuscany and Umbria over one otherwise inauspicious June weekend. I ended up enjoying the drive of a lifetime.

The capacity of Italians to create beauty is unparalleled. Let's not just talk about the mighty artists and architects of the Renaissance. The everyday folks who laid out the villages, built the private houses and parish churches, and conformed their agriculture to the landscape - these were people of consummate taste. The auto enthusiasts who first selected the route of the Mille Miglia back in 1927 were also inspired by genius. The 1,000-mile course they charted from Brescia to Rome and back provides near-spiritual aesthetic gratification coupled with almost-demonic challenges for the physical capabilities of both men and motorcars.

Revving my rented Fiat to its red line, I accelerated along the streets of Viterbo and heard my exhaust note echo off 500-year-old stone walls. I provoked a four-wheel drift in the switchbacks leading up to Radicofani.  Along the straight between Bologna and Modena I put the pedal to the metal and held on for dear life. My admiration for Moss, Jenkinson, Retter, and Larcher is compounded. More than a half-century ago they pushed themselves and their Mercedes vehicles to the limit on these roads, leaving their respective competition in the dust.

Over the years, Moss and the 300SLR race car he drove to glory in the Mille Miglia have been reunited on numerous occasions. That Silver Arrow has a place of honor in the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart, and the gallant octogenarian is a frequent guest at vintage events organized by the Stuttgart firm.

I am happy to report that in 2000 Mercedes-Benz also recognized the scruffy 180D and rallyist Wolfgang Larcher for their great achievement in garnering a class win in the Mille Miglia. On the 45th anniversary of that compression-ignition triumph, Mercedes brought the old diesel sedan, Herr Larcher, and a new C-Class Diesel to Italy for an informal rerun of the legendary race. Larcher recalled his hour of glory and the unflappable reliability of the 180D sedan: "We drove all out. Tanked up when we needed fuel. And we drove all out again. No problems." The elderly gentleman was duly impressed by the power and torque of Mercedes's new diesel technology. With characteristic Austrian wit, Larcher speculated that if he and his copilot Retter had had a 170-horsepower Mercedes-Benz C270CDI at their disposal back in '55, they might have given Moss a run for his money for overall first-place honors.