Faster, page 22
“No, I can’t do it,” he said. “I don’t have enough leeway. I’m losing too much in the early laps.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am.”
Monsieur Charles looked at him. He had always told René that the decision to go rested with his driver and with him alone. “All right. Bonne nuit,” he said.
That night, back at their apartment on the western edge of the city, René and Chou-Chou had dinner together, then took their hound, Minka Stuck, for a walk. The little dog was a gift from Hans and Paula Stuck—the couples had become close over the years, not least because of the persecution both faced because of anti-Semitism. Their friendship was representative of the complicated nature of relationships between Grand Prix drivers. After all, Stuck had personally campaigned Hitler to support racing—and record attempts—while at the same time suffering from the prejudices he stoked. These pressures weighed heavily.
René and Chou-Chou watched the sky darken over Bois de Boulogne. In the late summer, the birds sang well into the evening. Sometime after 10:00 p.m., they readied for bed.
Chou-Chou was already in her pajamas when their phone rang. She quickly answered it and spoke in whispers.
After a few moments, René asked, “Who is it?”
“Monsieur Charles,” Chou-Chou said before drawing away again.
“What is it about?” René asked, now hovering.
“Oh, nothing at all.”
“If it’s about doing the Million tomorrow, I’m not going.”
She waved him away and talked some more to the Delahaye boss. Finally, she hung up and returned to the bedroom.
“What did he want?” René asked, exasperated.
“Oh, nothing!” Chou-Chou said. “He just wanted to know your impressions from your practice earlier. That’s all.”
Exhausted, René went to bed. His plan for the next day was to start with a nice long lie-in, followed by an afternoon of practice at the track.
In what felt like mere moments after he had fallen asleep, the alarm clock on his bedside table clattered. He squinted at it. It was only 5:30 a.m. He turned to Chou-Chou and grumbled, “There are no tests this morning.” He could not understand why she had set the alarm.
“It’s all ready,” she said, rising from bed. “Come on and get up, René. You’re trying the Million today at ten o’clock.”
René shook his head. No. No way. He needed more practice.
Chou-Chou told him that he would never be completely prepared but that he would have to try anyway. René told her that she was wrong. He would reach the point when he was sure he could do it. He just needed more time. Monsieur Charles and Lucy believed differently, Chou-Chou said. They were both convinced that he must shoot for the prize today. Hence the phone call late the night before. They did not want to give him the opportunity to back out.
“No!” René blustered.
“Shut up, calm down, and get dressed,” Chou-Chou snapped. The timekeepers were on their way to the track. The press had been informed. As would everybody in Paris as soon as the morning’s papers hit the newsstands, since each would carry the news of his scheduled attempt.
His hand had been forced. René steeled himself to go.
11
The Duel
RENÉ DROVE OUT of Paris in his black Delahaye coupé, Chou-Chou sitting beside him, Minka on the back seat. René was wearing a jacket and slacks, his wife a striped blue blouse and flannel skirt. They looked like they might have been heading out to the countryside for the weekend in the elegantly bodied car with its swooping art-deco lines.
Instead, René steered toward Montlhéry. His face wore a grim look, and there was a stilted silence in the car. Although resolved to try for the Million Franc prize, René was deeply cross over the deception by his wife and race team. He suspected that his anger had been stirred on purpose by Lucy and Monsieur Charles to make him more aggressive during the run. The thought that he could be played so easily only upset him further.
Once off the highway, they followed a rough road toward the plateau where Montlhéry stood. The top of its grandstand eventually appeared on the horizon. At the entrance, they passed some buildings where the track’s administration staff worked. Then the slender concrete columns that supported the autodrome’s banked bowl came into view. An Autocar writer described them as “branchless and petrified trees.” To stand under the concrete bowl while cars raced overhead was akin to being in an earthquake.
René parked and then headed to a dressing room underneath the autodrome to change into his white racing suit. When he emerged out of the tunnel, he found a crowd of journalists and timekeepers on the track. Still furious, he avoided greeting Monsieur Charles or Lucy.
The Delahaye 145 was ready in the pits. Its body remained a bare aluminum shell, ugly as ever, with no Delahaye or Écurie Bleue markers. Its engine was already warmed up by the time René arrived. François and his crew had worked overnight to ensure that everything was tip-top with the car, but he wanted René to take a few laps of the course first. René took his time. It was a gray morning. The pavement was dry. Occasional gusts of wind swept across the plateau, and he knew that any headwind would slow him down. If given the choice, he would have delayed the run. But the decision was no longer his to make. Everybody was on hand and eager that he go.
After a break in the pits, René performed his ritual check of the triple knot on his shoelaces, then climbed back into the cockpit. Everyone was in position, including Chou-Chou, in the timekeeper’s stand by the starting line. She would relay his lap times by telephone to a Delahaye mechanic stationed in a water tower a kilometer into the course. That way, René would know almost immediately how he had done on the previous lap and whether he needed to push faster.
He rolled the car toward the starting line. He was very anxious about his chances, particularly because of the wind. He had nothing to say to Lucy or to anybody else on his team. Monsieur Charles came up beside the 145. “You have our confidence,” he said.
René barely nodded in reply.
Leaning against the wall of the track was Robert Benoist. In the grandstands, also taking note of the competition, was Prince Wilhelm von Urach, a manager for the Mercedes race team. With binoculars around his neck, he made no effort to hide his presence. A herd of French and foreign journalists, and even a cameraman, were on hand to record René’s attempt as well.
René placed his hand on the gearshift and readied his feet on the clutch and accelerator. The twelve-cylinder engine reverberated through to his grip on the steering wheel. The weight of everybody’s expectations fell heavy on him. So too did his desire to prove that he had reawakened the fearless instinct that saw him first claim Grand Prix victory. That he deserved to be fielded against the best drivers in the world, regardless of politics.
Sixteen laps. Two hundred kilometers. In one hour, twenty-one minutes, and fifty-four seconds or less. Every second counted, particularly in the first lap, which was begun from a standing position.
The starter raised the flag. René revved the engine, its guttural rasp breaking through the quiet morning air. His blood felt frozen in his veins.
At 10:00 a.m. sharp, the flag dropped, and the Delahaye 145 leaped forward, its tires smoking on the concrete track.
René swept past the grandstand and dove off the bowl through a narrow opening onto the tarred road that led from the autodrome. It hadn’t been the quickest start, and his arms felt deadened by nerves. He shifted into top gear to take the downhill two-kilometer straight at top speed. To his left was a scattering of trees and heather. To his right, a slender ribbon of grass and wildflowers separated this outbound road from the one he would return along to the opposite side of the autodrome.
At the end of the straight, which he took at almost 210 kph (130 mph), the road drifted to the right before reaching the Lacets de Couard. The easy part of the course was over. He rapidly shifted gears through three bends, then the road pitched at a precipitous downgrade into Épingle des Bruyères, the hairpin that had to be taken at a creeping pace. Shortly after that, he crossed the four-kilometer marker and braked as he entered another turn. He could only briefly hit fourth gear in the straight that followed before Les Biscornes, the westernmost point of the circuit. When he emerged from its series of right-hand bends—it resembled a square—he was halfway through the course.
His driving was not effortless. He worried that he had lost too much time. But there was no way yet to tell.
Another kilometer straight followed. It had an uphill grade and could have been taken at top speed throughout except that it was interrupted by a troublesome dip that would have shot his car skyward had he tried. He pushed as fast as he could. Gusts of wind struck the side of his Delahaye, bucking it slightly off his line.
Just past the seven-kilometer marker, the road rose steeply again into the Virage de la Forêt, a right-angle corner by a stand of trees. Shifting out of it, René then darted through two gentle bends, making sure to keep his tail from sliding out sideways because of his speed. The course was now generally at an even grade, but his arms and legs got little rest as he was suddenly into another sharp corner. When he straightened out of it, René followed the road that ran parallel to the outward-bound stretch of the circuit. Again he hit top speed, a haze of dust behind him.
After the ninth kilometer, he made the long left-hand bend where Ascari had flipped over and died. René survived the sweep into the straight that followed. Ahead rose the columns of the banked autodrome. He reached the sharp Virage de la Ferme, then tracked the edge of the bowl before braking at the Épingle du Faye, another hairpin.
ADATTO ARCHIVES
René on the Montlhéry road circuit during the Million Franc run in August 1937
Desperate to know his time, René barreled through the slender opening back onto the wide concrete surface of the autodrome. He was now opposite the straight on which he had started and was almost finished with the first lap.
He took the eastern banking of the bowl very fast, centrifugal force keeping his tires on the concrete. Out of the bend, he dove into the straight by the grandstand, making sure to correct from any swerve caused by where the banking met the flat.
Chou-Chou clicked her stopwatch to register René’s time. Onlookers cheered as he passed, their voices lost in the snarl from the 145 engine. One lap down. Fifteen to go.
The crowds tracked the Delahaye as it thundered out of the autodrome again. They would see very little of it, just hear the screech of its tires and the echoed pitch of its engine altering as René transitioned through the gears in rapid succession.
Soon after, at the water tower, René looked for his time on the blackboard.
Five minutes, 22.9 seconds.
Slow. Way too slow. “That’s not enough. I won’t do it,” he told himself. He needed to average five minutes, seven seconds on each lap.
Even with the standing start, it was a crushingly bad time. To claim the first tranche of the Million fund for Bugatti, Wimille had run the same lap five seconds faster. René had a nearly sixteen-second deficit to recover from now.
He maneuvered through the road course, his arms and legs still feeling leaden. He needed to settle down. He needed to trust himself. The 145 was running well. He had to do better—much better.
He swung the wheel back and forth through the Lacets de Couard, braked hard at the Épingle des Bruyères, rounded out of Les Biscornes, and sped along the swift straight before the Virage de la Forêt. After another stretch of the course and two sharp turns, he returned to the autodrome, then slingshotted out of the banked bowl past the grandstands again.
Lap two done. He soon received his time at the water tower: five minutes, 10.2 seconds. Again too slow. He had done nothing at all to chisel at the deficit and had only added to it.
Nineteen seconds to make up now.
Discipline. Precision. He needed both to make the necessary average. If he failed to hit it on the third lap, his attempt might well be lost. He pushed faster into and out of each turn. Started to feel the course better. His reactions quickened.
Third lap: five minutes, seven seconds. On mark. Average speed: 146.6 kph. It was well won, but René had to improve and knock off one second, maybe two, per lap to climb out of the hole he had dug for himself. Over the next three laps, he managed to average the same: five minutes, seven seconds. It was not good enough. Ten rounds of the circuit remained. Now he had to reduce his times almost to five minutes, five seconds on each and every lap. He was already pushing at the edge of his ability—and at that of the Delahaye.
Eking out a couple of seconds over a 12.5-kilometer course was an immense challenge. René was already taking the best line into each hairpin. His speed in the straights, down the hills, and around the long bends approached the limit of what the car could bear and hold the road. The brakes and tires could only be strained so much. At best, he might shave tenths of seconds out of each lap.
Any error or misjudgment would cost dear time, but worse, it might launch him off the course or over the top edge of the autodrome. Drivers had died at Montlhéry in similar record attempts, which were no less dangerous than real races. Shortly after René left Maserati, one of its drivers, Amedeo Ruggeri, had lost control on the Montlhéry bowl during an attempt at the World Hour Record. His car somersaulted five times before coming to a standstill on the track, and he never regained consciousness. René’s close friend Stanisław Czaykowski had catapulted off a similar autodrome during the Monza Grand Prix. René had to force away such thoughts—and those of his own crashes in the past. He needed to match his course discipline with boldness now.
In the seventh lap, the wind picked up. Any tenths of seconds stolen by the gusts René committed to recovering. He blazed around the course, eyes trained on the bumps, dips, and turns ahead. The stretches of grass on the roadside passed in brushstrokes of green. The slim windshield barely cut down the rush of air that buffeted his cheeks. As he cycled through the gears, the bark of his engine deafened him. His body shook as the Delahaye danced over the bumpy sections of the tarred road.
A hard left. Then a straight. Then a stomach-plummeting descent into the hairpin. No mercy on the brakes. Cut the next corner sharp—gain inches. Another straight. Left. Then a long, seemingly endless right bend. After coming around the sharp Épingle du Faye, René whipped into the autodrome. His field of vision down the hood tilted on its side as he drove up the bank. Sky to his left. Concrete to his right. Orientation became difficult, and he had the sensation of being a fly clinging to a wall. There was no rail or fence to stop him from soaring over the top, and every depression in the concrete made his car bounce. He stuck tight and then flung down into the straight.
His time on that lap: five minutes, 5.6 seconds. That was it. Much better. He had won almost 1.5 seconds from his deficit. Yet he had to coax even more speed out of every bend. After the eighth lap, the halfway point, he quickly learned that he had done just that, finishing in five minutes, five seconds flat. Now he was only fifteen seconds down from a Million win. His confidence was growing.
Over the next four laps—nine, ten, eleven, twelve—he fought the bucking and heaving of the wind to manage slightly better than an average of five minutes, five seconds through the course’s dozen bends, eight corners, and two hairpin turns. He was in rhythm, feeling in perfect union with the Delahaye and their assault together on the course. They must keep to it. Every moment.
Fewer than six seconds remained in their deficit.
In the stands, Lucy and Laury watched the clock closely, willing René to go faster. Down by the pits, Monsieur Charles and François were doing the same. Their car and their driver needed to stay strong through the final four laps.
Not a few journalists with their own chronometers felt like Delahaye had a shot now.
René threaded through the thirteenth lap, sure that the constant braking and accelerating were wearing his rear tires thin. He knew this was a risk, and a Dunlop representative was stationed on the road course to alert him if he saw one of the rubber treads giving way to canvas and threatening a burst tire. Such an event would be cataclysmic to his attempt—and maybe even his life. So far, the Dunlop man had given no indication that anything was wrong.
Returning toward the autodrome in the thirteenth lap, René smelled something acrid in the air. Something burning. Ahead at the Épingle du Faye, smoke billowed across the hairpin. In a nearby field, a farmer was burning weeds. René should have slowed. The smoke obscured the contours of the road. But he could not lose the time.
He knew the turn by heart and decided to take it on faith. He pressed his foot on the gas and emerged out of the hairpin and its dense gray screen to shoot back into the autodrome and finish another lap. Five minutes, 5.3 seconds.
He was within striking distance of overcoming his time debt. Three laps to go. In the fourteenth, René blistered through the straights and turns and clocked his best lap yet: five minutes, 3.9 seconds. He was now less than half a second in the hole.
Everybody in the autodrome, most of all Lucy, who was watching the Delahaye speed past into its fifteenth lap, sensed the possibility of the Million.
René only needed to run slightly better than five minutes, seven seconds. He had done so in the past half-dozen laps. Journalists scribbled in their notebooks. The cameraman tried to keep his lens trained on the car as it disappeared through the narrow gates back onto the road course. Chou-Chou rapidly spoke into the phone to the water-tower relay to make sure her husband knew how well he was running. The Delahaye boss and his engineer prayed that the engine would hold.
René whipped down the first straight toward the Lacets de Couard, then down to the Épingle des Bruyères. The Dunlop man, Kessa, was down in the grass as the Delahaye clung around the hairpin, frantically waving his hands. He could see the warning strip of the white canvas underneath the rubber. The tire’s tread was wearing off and it might burst at any moment.
