Pau: no Grand Prix for 2010 ?
#1
Posted 29 October 2009 - 17:17
Having been very closely involved with the organisers of the first Historic Grand Prix it was clear that the only way the event could exist was by sharing the infrastructure with the modern races be they F3000, F3 or WTCC.
Pau is a lovely town set in the Pyrenees and the street circuit really is something of a throwback with tight, heavily cambered corners. Unlike many of the updated or new circuits in towns Pau is still very much the challenge it was years ago.
With an illustrious list of winners such as Clark and Stewart it would be sad if this event does not return
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#2
Posted 30 October 2009 - 08:10
#3
Posted 30 October 2009 - 20:44
Carles.
#4
Posted 30 October 2009 - 21:34
I was able to walk and drive around the circuit and hadn't realised what a great track it was. And it really is a quite marvellous town. The Boulevard des Pyrénées with it's magnificent views, the Chateau, the shops, bars and restaurants - all had a lovely ambience.
Various TNFers have waxed lyrical about it subsequently when I've asked them about it and I had been planning a return to see some racing there.
Whilst we were there we also visited the Tourist Office - probably because we found ourselves walking past - and I was amazed to see a rolling video/DVD of the Grand Prix de Pau with film footage and images of Nuvolari, Wimille, Lang, Fangio, Behra, Brabham, Clark, Rindt and Stewart, right up to Reine Wisell’s 1971 victory in the LIRA Lotus. (And if you are wondering how the hell I can remember all of this, it's simply that I wrote most of these words then and left them in a file...)
I also discovered a motor racing bookshop called Motor Mania: an absolute treasure trove – some most unusual French books (including Gerard Gamand's magnificent GRAC opus) and some astounding colour and black & white posters of Formula One and Sports Prototype Cars from the late sixties and early seventies, a number of them signed by the drivers.
Needless to say, I was eventually hauled out by my wife and daughters, but I've have often chuckled to myself since about the prospect of Sterling being in there for days on end!!!
Great place. MUST go in 2011.
Maybe a TNF trip??
#5
Posted 30 October 2009 - 21:44
What a great idea. It's 30+ years since I went to the Pau GP, and I've always wanted to go back.Maybe a TNF trip??
Edited by Tim Murray, 30 October 2009 - 21:45.
#6
Posted 30 October 2009 - 22:26
#7
Posted 31 October 2009 - 02:26
Circumstances permitting, I'd be very interested in that idea, too.
Me too. I only went to Pau once as a spectator on a Page and Moy charter for the F3000 teams, in 1993 I think it was, and I have always promised myself that I would go back some day.
Franck Lagorce won the F3000 race followed by Coulthard and Paul Stewart. The sight and sound of those cars coming out of the hairpin in front of the station and then blasting up a steep hill with a stone embankment on one side and a park on the other will live with me for a long time.
One of the great things about Pau was the quality of the support programme. The year I was there they even had an evening session with free admission for the local residents to compensate for the noise and inconvenience. Various French club championships entertained thousands of spectators seated with wine and baguettes on the steep grassy bank overlooking the sation hairpin whilst Renault 5s three wheeled around it. Several rolled to huge cheers from the crowd. The marshals just rocked them back onto their wheels and off they went again.
The town is magic, full of history and with some of the best restaurants in the world and in the midst of fabulous scenery. You can see the snow covered Pyrennes in the distance from the spectator areas. It isn't cheap and the locals speak more Spanish than English. Getting there isn't easy either but if you treat it as an adventure worth it. I went on a charter plane from Stansted. We had radio failure on the tarmac and took off an hour and a half late after some electronics guys from Zytek who were on the plane went into the cockpit and fixed it. The flight included mechanics from many teams. One guy even managed to check in a Reynard 93D nosecone as hand luggage! The airport is primitive and had more or less closed for the night by the time we got there. We sat in the plane for quite a while before a peasant in blue overalls, complete with Gauloise pushed steps up to the plane door by hand for us to disembark. I went to my hotel but the mechanics had to start fettling the cars straight away. They worked in white marquees set up in the market square and the whole atmosphere was very informal and approachable.
Afterwards I had a long chat in schoolboy French in the airport departure lounge with Jean Christophe Boullion who had stared in the Formula Ford race achieving a points scoring finish in a Kent engined car in a Zetec race! I made a note of his name even though he was on his own with no manager or hangers on and seemed very shy and awkward, not like the slick, media savvy, over managed clones you find in British FF teams these days. I wonder how much of that he retained and how much it hindered his later career?
I hope the event does return in 2011 because the heritage of Pau is too valuable to lose. But even if it doesn't the memories are among my most treasured.
#8
Posted 31 October 2009 - 08:59
Years will go by then someone in Pau will come up with an idea "How about a Revival meeting".
#9
Posted 31 October 2009 - 10:10
DCN
#10
Posted 31 October 2009 - 10:38
Pau have slowly slid towards this for some years, it should have remained a single seater race, but the conformity of modern single seater racing mean that the GP2 is only run as support of F1, instead of being a real series sometime on the F1 program, sometimes not.
As an aside I also decry the loss of F3 as a Monaco support race, this was where all F3 drivers off all series would come once a year, and the true F3 champion would be crowned (and yes there were tire rules making it more easy to be a continental Champion than a British).
Basically contemporary Auto Racing have become marketing marvels, which have completely lost the history and pedigree which have gone in to creating the current Marketing Marvels. I know that I am a sentimental old coot, but can not help thinking that were the pedigree held in more esteem by the powers to be, then F1 and auto racing at large would be doing better than what it is.
I fear that Pau not being run in 2010, mean that Pau is gone. A sad day indeed.
#11
Posted 01 November 2009 - 00:41
Edited by D-Type, 01 November 2009 - 00:44.
#12
Posted 01 November 2009 - 12:22
Madame LIGNIERES-CASSOU
Maire de Pau
64000-PAU
France
#13
Posted 01 November 2009 - 12:34
That is the worry. What is the logic behind this decision?Wisdom has it that the Grand Prix will never recover after a 1-year abscence.
#14
Posted 01 November 2009 - 15:03
Does Jackie Stewart know?
#15
Posted 27 May 2011 - 07:37
I saw modern F.3, Historic F.3 and electric cars that seemed to find the armco very appealing. Race won by Tambay (The Younger) I believe.
A sad, far cry from what Roger and I saw there a few years ago, although I don't know what was run on Saturday as I was on my way back from holiday.
#16
Posted 27 May 2011 - 08:00
http://gppau.alkamelsystems.com/
Use the drop-down menu for the Historique.
Edited by Giraffe, 27 May 2011 - 08:02.
#17
Posted 27 May 2011 - 08:52
Peter Auto cannot run Pau and LMC in the same year.
The entry was pathetic two years ago and not much better this year.
It also costs if you have an incident there.The kerbs are inside the ARMCO in some places.
With entrants seeming to start consider the costs they do not want to spend the types of entry fees and potential damage costs of a Pau type race.They are now very pickey.
Goodwood,Le Mans Classic ,Monaco are the major race meetings and then there are the rest.
Aberdovey, excellent idea,great Golf Course.
#18
Posted 27 May 2011 - 09:46
#19
Posted 27 May 2011 - 10:59
That was not original intention.
They have the permanent track 10 mins down the road.
It's not that bad for one of these new tracks.
Used it on Tour Auto couple of times..
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#20
Posted 27 May 2011 - 16:28
Poorer-quality offering from John Fairley's Brabham in the pre-'66 GP cars race
http://www.youtube.c...feature=related
http://www.youtube.c...feature=related
Same race seen from the stands
http://www.youtube.c...feature=related
Pre-'66 GTs
http://www.youtube.c...feature=related
Pre-war
http://www.youtube.c...feature=related
#21
Posted 27 May 2011 - 18:56
#22
Posted 27 May 2011 - 19:34
He'd do well to brush up on his heel-and-toe techniquePoorer-quality offering from John Fairley's Brabham in the pre-'66 GP cars race
#23
Posted 27 May 2011 - 21:15
#24
Posted 31 May 2011 - 09:20
Unfortunatley, size 11 feet, gnarled by years of competative football in a car made for feet half that size, together with an array of chassis tubes and bulheads makes it impossible to bridge the two pedals under braking. Never mind I still came second however the camera does need a clean.He'd do well to brush up on his heel-and-toe technique
Edited by jonbt11, 31 May 2011 - 11:02.
#25
Posted 31 May 2011 - 11:42
Hope I didn't offend
And welcome to the forum
#26
Posted 31 May 2011 - 11:59
No offence taken, I wasnt designed to fit into the Historic cars. We have moved the pedals as far back as they will go and also cut the throttle and moved it out but i still manage to hit both brake and throttle at the same time now and again.Thanks Jon
Hope I didn't offend
And welcome to the forum