by HoTWire
22. October 2009 03:19
The 23rd October sees the start of the five day Carrera Panamericana, the world famous road race through Mexico, started in 1950 as a celebration of the opening of the Mexican section of the Panamerican Highway the race is one of the most spectacular and challenging road races in the world.
Covering a distance of over two thousand miles along the new highway the race run in its original form until 1954, the 1955 event was cancelled due to the massive accident at Le Mans. From its start until the cancelation the race had moved from become an amateur affair to a much more professional endeavour in both its running and the cars in competition. Ferrari, Alfa Romeo and Lancia were hugely popular European makes represented, with American cars such as Lincoln, Chevrolet and Dodge competing also. Over the five years it ran the race claimed twenty seven lives, it existed in a time when speed was far and away ahead of safety for racing drivers.
The event was resurrected in 1988 as a retrospective event, covering a slightly altered route, but about the same distance using the classic cars. The modern event has become a huge spectacle and the popularity of it has been added by the film La Carrera Panamericana with it's Pink Floyd sound track.
Over the years many famous people took part in the race, Mickey Thompson, Carroll Shelby, Jerry Unser, Alberto Ascari, Juan Manual Fangio and Phil Hill to name a few of the people that competed in the original race. The modern races have seen their fair share of famous faces with Alain De Cadenet winning the event in 1990 and the various members of Pink Floyd competing also.
The current class structure is separated into Competition and Historics. The Competition group is made up of cars built between 1940 and 1954, a lot of these cars are heavily modified, including the Sports Mayer class which allows modern engines to be installed in older cars. The other group is Historic which is from 1955 to 1965, these are less modified and separated out into sub classes based on the number of cylinders in the engine. There is also a class for cars that originally competed in the Pan Americana, this allows replicas but they must be the same body material and basic configuration as the original car.
For a real flavour of the event check out the brilliant Flickr photostream and be sure to check out the official website.
We'll give you and update once the race has run its course. Until then, enjoy this video :
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