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Overland to Imola
A Visit to the 1997 San Marino Formula One Grand Prix

By Tim Shaw

San Marino, one of the three smallest sovereign states in Europe, is described by the Lonely Planet travel guide as a tiny, toy soldier decorated theme park for the amusement of tourists. Perhaps the lack of physical space is the reason why the San Marino Formula One Grand Prix actually takes place in Italy.

I can't verify this description of San Marino, as I have never been there. I did make it as far as nearby Imola though, for the recent grand prix.

With only 2 weeks notice that we would be in Italy while the grand prix was on, I began a frantic world wide hunt for tickets. Many phone, fax and internet hours later, I managed to find an English company which could provide two tickets for a stand at Acque Minerale, a corner where the cars pass close by. For a mere 50% more than the official price, plus courier fees, the tickets were soon on their way to meet us in Northern Italy. I charged the tickets to my Mastercard, and I'm sure it's no coincidence that the recently collapsed Mastercard sponsored Lola F1 team were talking about coming out of liquidation for the race at Imola, around the time the transaction was processed. The suitcase was duly packed with Ferrari shirt, jacket and hat, earplugs and a copy of the Italian railway timetable, as we were staying with relatives in Villa Raspa, about three hours away from Imola in Northern Italy, and would need to catch 3 different trains to get to the track.

Race day, and the alarm interrupts our sleep at 6am. Bleary eyes note that outside it is cold, dark, miserable and bucketing down. I see visions of three hours of train travel and two hours of sitting in the pouring rain at the race before another three hours of train travel home, cold and wet. The temptation to hit the snooze button and watch the race on TV is strong, until I remember how much the tickets cost.

Refusing offers of a hearty Italian breakfast from Fiona's grandmother, who has left a warm bed on a cold morning just to make sure we eat well before leaving, we head for our little Opel Kadett which is standing outside in the pouring rain. Fiona's grandmother settles for tucking some cartons of fruit juice into our backpack. With headlights on, wipers at full speed and heater blasting (would you believe summer is only a couple of weeks away?) we head for Bassano railway station. My cunning plan, carefully constructed after studying the railway timetable for countless minutes, involves changing trains twice, first at Padova and then at Bologna, and will have us at Imola station at 12 midday. Incidentally we decided against driving all the way to Imola because I had heard that traffic is particularly heavy around Imola on race day and the last thing I wanted was to spend hours in an Italian traffic jam. Someone later told us it once took them six hours to drive home after the race.

We park outside Bassano railway station, buy tickets for the trip to Imola and back, and sit next to the heater to wait for our 7:27 am train, keeping a sharp eye on platform 2 from where it is due to leave. There's no sign of our train as 7:27 approaches and all we can see is another train pulling out from platform 3. A blast of cold air hits us as we go out onto the platform to seek advice from someone who looks important. Padova? You want the 7:27 to Padova? That was it, he says, pointing to the back end of a rapidly disappearing train that is so painfully close the thought of chasing it briefly crosses my mind. But that train left from platform 3, we protest. No, platform 2 he insists. We point to the large number 3 hanging over our heads. He shrugs. It doesn't matter. My cunning plan is unravelling already. Back to sit by the heater.

The next train leaves in 40 minutes. It means we miss all the connecting trains at other stations, and have to wait for later trains. Best projected time of arrival in Imola is now revised to 1pm. One hour to get off the train, locate the track, find our seats and settle in for the race. The tension mounts. The rains continues. We're wishing we had eaten breakfast. Try to stay calm.

We finally make it to Padova, and wait for an hour or two for the train to Bologna. Very hungry. Even McDonald's over the road looks tempting. We succumb, only to be mocked as we dicover that even McDonald's is closed on a cold, rainy Sunday morning in Padova. Departure time is approaching. We go to the platform early - there's no missing the next one. We hear an announcement in muffled Italian that includes the word Bologna. It's a couple of minutes early which tells us it may not be the right train (Italian trains run on time almost to the second) but we don't want to take the chance of missing it. If it goes to Bologna we're on it. We board the train. The seats look a bit too nice, we could be in first class by mistake. Better not sit here or we could get a nasty fine or be thrown off in a wet field. We search for a second class seat in the non-smoking carriage. We hear an announcement mentioning Firenze. Panic attack - we may be on a train to Florence. Find a conductor. He says, yes it is going to Bologna. We find some nice seats - this is the nicest, most comfortable train I've ever seen. I go to sleep.

A conductor believes checking our tickets is more important than letting me sleep. I hand him the tickets, he gives them a long look. He says some big words in Italian. Fiona translates. We are on a train that is too nice for peasants such as ourselves - we must pay extra, right now. I wish we had been to a bank before leaving. We hand over what was to be our lunch money to cover the fine. The visions of being cold and wet become visions of being cold, wet and very, very hungry. Misty green fields and crumbling farmhouses roll by outside the window.

We wait at Bologna for an hour or more for the train to Imola, frustrating since Imola is only 20 minutes away. At least the rain has stopped. And down in the tunnels of the train station we found an automatic teller machine that gave us some money. Happy days! The train arrives at last. We see several people with red hats and cameras with many large lenses. At last we must be on the right train. We arrive at Imola at 1pm and get directions to the track. So far we've been travelling for 6 hours. The picturesque streets of Imola are deserted. Either we're in the wrong town or just very, very late. It's a beautiful town, with many typical old syle Italian buildings and cobblestone streets, and is just what you expect to see in an Italian village. We snap a photo and make a hasty mental note that Imola is a pretty town as we scurry towards the track.

Fiona asks where I packed the earplugs. In my suitcase, of course. That would be the suitcase which is currently in a room 6 hours north of where we are. No problem, at every grand prix I've ever been to, earplugs were as common as the 10 year olds selling them - expect to pay no more than a dollar a pair. We ask an official for directions to Acque Minerale - we receive a grunt and vague finger pointing. No ten year olds in sight. We ask at an information stand where to buy earplugs. We receive confused looks and vague finger pointing. We continue towards our seats, stopping at every Ferrari merchandise stand to ask for earplugs. We may as well ask for directions to the Williams fan club. We get all the way to our stand, which turns out to be a large concrete flight of stairs perched amongst a general admission area on a muddy, rubbish covered hill. Lucky I wore the hiking boots. Many tents indicate some people have been here for days. Fiona is unimpressed to see a race fan exercising the age old European custom of going to the toilet anywhere you damn well please, as we slip and slide up the hill toward the ticket collectors at the stand. At this point we can't help thinking of the Melbourne GP, sunshine, flowers, tables with umbrellas, people taking the rubbish out of your hands before you even have a chance to drop it, and it's cheaper to buy a ticket as well. Back to reality. Our tickets are checked and Fiona asks desperately where we can buy some earplugs. All three officials within earshot turn to us in unison and laugh in our faces. The message is clear - Italians spurn industrial deafness and do not use earplugs. Tim's GP Tip number 1 - take your own earplus to any GP in Italy. Fiona wisely refuses to watch the race without earplugs. A glimpse of the big screen shows the cars on the starting grid. Over six and a half hours since we left home. Twenty minutes to race start time. Try to stay calm.

We return to the infield to search frantically for earplugs. I spy some more merchandise stalls in the distance and set off at a run. I ask the lady at the first stand. After months of intensive Italian lessons, I know ten different ways to offer her a cup of coffee. If only I knew the word for earplugs as well. I resort to putting my fingers in my ears and she seems to get the message. No go - vague finger pointing at another stall down the street. I run, gasping, and as I get closer I see some pairs of full blown race team style yellow and red earmuffs. They would have done, if only I had brought enough money to buy them. More pointing at ears. Success, and for no more than the cost of a medium sized yacht I am the proud owner of two sets of earplugs. Ten minutes to race start. I run back to where Fiona is waiting, wishing I wasn't so unfit and making a mental note to befriend a good heart surgeon when I get home. We walk back to our stand and see the man collecting tickets. Vague finger pointing in the direction of our seats, and many Italian words spoken to Fiona, of which I can understand many forms of "sorry", shoulder shrugs etc. Fiona explains that he has said that our seats are somewhere up the back of the stand, and people move around a lot, so our seats may or may not be still free, you know how it is. Tension builds. We have travelled across the world and then for another seven hours. We have caught three trains and been fined by a conductor. We have paid enough money for tickets to make an F1 team talk about coming out of receivership. If our seats are not free, someone is going to die. Try to stay calm. Luck smiled on us at last, and our two plastic saucers of muddy water were unoccupied. Tim's GP tip number 2 - take either something to sit on or something to dry your seat with to any GP in Europe. We took our places as the cars roared by on the parade lap.

Red lights out, and they're away. The sea of red-dressed fans at Acque Minerale (with the notable exception of two tired visitors from Victoria) rose to their feet as one with a massive cheer, as they did every time a Ferrari went past, or a Ferrari exited the pitlane after a stop, or whenever anything bad happened to a Williams. The corner turned out to be not a bad place to sit, as we had a close view of the cars and could see the rest of the track via a big screen in front of us. However, with the exception of Berger and Magnussen spinning off the track right in front of us, it was a fairly uneventful race, although Fiona being the die hard F1 fan she is managed to stay awake for almost five laps. Despite being on a reasonably tight corner, we didn't see a single overtaking manoeuvre all day.

The view on the track was probably less spectacular than the picture postcard view beyond it - immediately over the concrete barriers lay extensive vineyards that ran away to the base of lush green hills, dotted with majestic Italian villas. The Ferraris finished second and third, which seems to go down as a loss with the Italian crowd, and everyone pretty much got up and went home. As we had gone straight to our seats before the race, I was keen to have a look around the track before leaving, but that proved impossible. Every possible walking space, including the track, was a solid mass of people moving towards the exit gates, and we had no choice but to shuffle the same way. The tightly packed crowd included several cars pushing their way through, running over toes where necessary. We were forced to flow with the crowd most of the way back to the railway station, and not being sure what time the train departed for our marathon journey home, we decided not to spend time exploring Imola, despite the impression that it was a very pretty town. Hence we squeezed onto a packed train back to Bologna having spent a sum total of 3 hours in Imola, seeing nothing but the street to and from the track, and the corner of track at Acque Minerale. As it turned out the trip home was a speedy four hours due to favourable train connections, and we only copped one more fine from a conductor, this time for failing to have our tickets stamped by a machine at the station, an oversight that apparently catches out many Italians as well.

We arrived home at Villa Raspa at 10pm, fifteen hours after leaving, to the comfort of a cosy Italian kitchen (Tim's GP tip number 3 - marry someone with relatives in Italy). It probably doesn’t pay to analyse these things, but on reflection, the breakdown of investment and return was something like this... 11 hours of travel, $600 for race tickets, $60 for train tickets, $25 for fines on trains. The race lasted for about an hour and three quarters, and I estimate we spent 75% of that time looking at an empty track, while the cars were somewhere else. So that adds up to about 25 minutes worth of entertainment in return for a 15 hour day and approximately $700 of hard earned cash. Worthwhile, you might ask? Normally I'm a firm believer in the enjoyment factor of actually being at a GP, rather than watching on TV. I realise now that for me, a large part of that enjoyment comes from not just seeing the cars go round in circles, but from the whole carnival-like experience, and to get that I need to be there for at least the entire race day, and preferably for practice and qualifying as well. In addition, I like to sit opposite the pits, because although this may be the worst place to see the cars while they are racing, it tends to give a much stronger feeling of "being there" and of getting more than what you see in the TV coverage. As we found, arriving at the track as the race starts, watching the cars pass at one corner, and then going home immediately after the race, left us with the feeling of never really having been there, except for the crumpled railway fines in our coat pockets and the emptiness of our wallets. Fiona suggested the option of putting future ticket money towards buying a nice big TV and watching the races from the comfort of our cosy lounge room. After Monaco last year I would have disagreed, but now after Imola I might think again. In summary, for a good GP experience, Tim's GP tip numbers 4, 5 and 6 - stay somewhere close, buy your tickets early and think carefully about where you sit.