1953 Merano Grand Prix

According to various internet sources, the Alfa Romeo 159 had a final fling at the 1953 Merano Grand Prix, driven to victory by Juan Manuel Fangio. Now, I know that Fangio won the 1953 Supercortemaggiore sports-car race at Merano in an Alfa Romeo 6C-3000, but I can't find strong evidence for any other win that year, so where did this rumour come from?

Looks to me like the original source might be Wouter Melissen's normally pretty reliable Ultimate Car Page site. Page posted 2003, last update 2006, so nearly 20 years of people copying without checking ...

https://www.ultimate...--Alfetta-.html

I suppose it's possible he might have done a demo lap or two in an Alfetta, but I've just looked at La Stampa's race report and there's nothing of that sort mentioned there.

There is a horse race called the Gran Premio Merano and I did idly wonder if that might hold a clue, but the 1953 winner was a horse called Montlouvier and none of the other winners seem to have any even vague motor sporting connection (although there was a 1940s Brazilian racehorse called Pintacuda, named after Carlo of that ilk!)

A further thought on that. Could Wouter have actually put that in to monitor whether people were plagiarising him without acknowledging the source? It was a well-known trick in mapmaking, used especially by Geographer's A-Z, who inserted entirely imaginary streets on their street plans to catch out other publishers who used their base maps without permission but claimed their products were from their own surveys and so didn't need to pay royalties. Ordnance Survey had various similar tricks up their sleeve, the existence of which was first revealed after a run-in over copyright with Bartholomews in the early 1900s.

A further thought on that. Could Wouter have actually put that in to monitor whether people were plagiarising him without acknowledging the source? It was a well-known trick in mapmaking, used especially by Geographer's A-Z, who inserted entirely imaginary streets on their street plans to catch out other publishers who used their base maps without permission but claimed their products were from their own surveys and so didn't need to pay royalties. Ordnance Survey had various similar tricks up their sleeve, the existence of which was first revealed after a run-in over copyright with Bartholomews in the early 1900s.

As if motor racing history websites would get up to such tricks!  The very idea!

This seems highly implausible.  Alfa Romeo had withdrawn from Grand Prix racing at the end of 1951, quitting while they were ahead.  They had continued racing sports cars in 1952 - 53.  Possibly there has been some confusion with Fangio winning in a wrorks Alfa Romeo 3000CM sports car in the Supercortemaggiore race at Merano in 1953.

A further thought on that. Could Wouter have actually put that in to monitor whether people were plagiarising him without acknowledging the source? It was a well-known trick in mapmaking, used especially by Geographer's A-Z, who inserted entirely imaginary streets on their street plans to catch out other publishers who used their base maps without permission but claimed their products were from their own surveys and so didn't need to pay royalties. Ordnance Survey had various similar tricks up their sleeve, the existence of which was first revealed after a run-in over copyright with Bartholomews in the early 1900s.

Trap streets.  Quite fun when I stumble on one.  I even lived in one (marked on the A-Z as a cul-de-sac when it was a building name).  Other tricks include having a short road put in as curved when it's straight, or lengthening a place name by adding "holme" or "ton" at the end.

Found the results of the 1953 Supercortemaggiore at http://www.wsrp.cz/n...amp1953.html#70 - Martin Krajzi's older site. To my delight discovering that Alfa Romeo, Lancia and Maserati entered with factory teams - but no factory Ferraris, this being one week before the Italian Grand Prix at Monza. 

Looking at bit further I found a race report from MotorSport: https://www.motorspo...ercortemaggiore. Don't know if it works for YOU (sorry), but it says that the Lancias were fast, but unreliable, with Fangio winning. Lasting just over 2 hours, but over an 18 kms road circuit it must have been a challenge nevertheless.

Interesting note from the MSM article are that already by 1953 there were different definisions of sports cars according to Nationality. The German and British sports car manufactures looked at their Italian competitors as pure racing cars.

Jesper

Edited by 70JesperOH, 01 October 2022 - 01:12.

I can open the article, and it looks fine. But the results are a bit less reliable, I would think:

Isi J. M. Fangio tAila-J(onwo 3-litre) 2 hr. 07 min. 23.8 see. -1.24:16,4.p.h. S. Maid ovoid (Nlitzieruti … 2 Inc. 13 min. 57.2 ore., ‘rd : P. Nngheira (Ferrari 3•Iiire) .. 2 hr, 117 atirk._45.4 lalrliellind

May I refer to the http://www.wsrp.cz/n...amp1953.html#70 for results, but ad that 3rd placed Nogiera now has a time of 2h07m45.4s one lap down. Hope this is helpfulf?

Jesper

Poor Portuguese drivers, no luck with MotorSport... José Nogueira Pinto becomes P. Nogheira and Casimiro de Oliveira (mentioned in the text) is transformed into Oliviera...

Poor Portuguese drivers, no luck with MotorSport... José Nogueira Pinto becomes P. Nogheira and Casimiro de Oliveira (mentioned in the text) is transformed into Oliviera...

The problem lies in the complex system of Portuguese names which is hardly compatible with most countries where people generally have one family name, albeit sometimes hyphenated.

I can't make head or tail of this:  https://en.wikipedia...Portuguese_name

I see your point and indeed Portuguese names can be complex. However, in this is case I think is more of a certain nonchalance when dealing with foreign names and a certain tendency to confound with Spanish names (Oliviera for Oliveira is a classic, as it is Gutierrez instead of Guterres or Ribiero instead of Ribeiro)