Recognize Enzo and Dino Ferrari International Racetrack as Treasure of Italy is an honour, a responsibility but, above all, a message we want to launch and renew to Italy and the world. If the story and strength of our country must to be found in people and places, to know, to safeguard and to promote those same people and those places is a duty of us all. The Imola Racetrack is a circuit of great traditions, the result of the will and commitment of a whole city that over the years has had the ability to organize to build and preserve what is now a monument to the past, a symbol for the present and a very important springboard for the future. A Treasure of Italy that certainly deserves more attention from the public and a more central place in the delicate context of international circuits. As we will discover during this 2019, Imola is not only the racetrack but an enchanting puzzle of culture and art. The Racetrack brings Imola into the world and the world to Imola and it does it reinventing itself bravously every time, in the form and in the contents. It is a “road made of insidious corners and very fast straights” in which it is not easy to extricate, it is true that driving a Racetrack requires capacity and talent as much as driving a Ferrari on the track.
Today this is what Tesori d’Italia certifies: a constantly moving piece of Italian history and an excellent team at work. We are ready to support the team of the Director Roberto Marazzi in the new promotion plan of the Racetrack in Italy and abroad, putting available our all network, our love for this Country and the desire to share its magic and beauty. Fasten the belts, this year on TdI, that races…
The Imola Enzo and Dino Ferrari Racetrack represents a piece of history, not only sport, of Italy. We all heard about it, we all felt, from its stands, from television or from radio, at least a little of the adrenaline that emanates.
The history of Italy’s most famous racing circuit begins on 25 April 1953 when it were officially inaugurated with the Grand Prix Coni, the Italian Motorcycling Championship that seen Masetti and Lorenzetti as winners. In the same year, the Racetrack management is assumed by E.S.T.I. (Entity Sport and Turism Imolese), with Tommaso Maffei Alberti as president.
The “Coppa d’Oro Shell” – translated “Shell Gold Cup” – comes to life which, promoted by the Imola Moto Club, becomes the most reputed motorcycle race in the sector, having an extraordinary success with the public.
In 1956, the Ferrari of Umberto Maglioli reached the finish line and two future protagonists of the history of world motoring were classified: the british Colin Chapman and the australian Jack Brabham. Another big international, Bernie Ecclestone, races in Imola in a motorbike race with a Norton Max. On April 21, 1963, the Formula 1 race will take place on the Imola track.
On 7 September 1967, it is the turn of the Motomondiale to settle at the Santerno circuit with the “Grand Prix of Nations”. The 1972 is the year of a great motorcycle novelty: Checco Costa invents the “Daytona of Europe”, or the legendary 200 Miles carried on the other side of the Atlantic.
After extensive renovation of the circuit and the construction of the new building for boxes – at the time the most modern in Europe – a new Formula 1 GP took place in September 1979. Although not valid for the World Championship, it sees the presence of all the teams participating in the championship. Niki Lauda wins on the Brabham of Bernie Ecclestone. The F1 settled permanently in Imola in 1980, where it will remain for over 25 years. In September, for the first time, a GP for the World Championship takes place: the 51st Italian Grand Prix.
Enzo Ferrari publishes a book where he recalls the construction of the Imola racetrack: “My first contact with Imola dates back to the spring of 1948. […] I considered from the first moment this hilly environment that could one day become a small Nurburgring for the natural difficulties meeting building the road belt would have encountered up, thus offering a truly selective path for men and cars. From this opinion, the promoters of Imola felt comforted. In May 1950, it began to build. I was present at the ceremony of the first stone, put by the lawyer Onesti with the greeting of CONI and a contribution of 40 million that I think was the first gesture of the entity to sports motoring. A small Nurburgring – I repeated that day looking around – a small Nurburgring, with equal and spectacular technical resources and an ideal path length. This conviction has been achieved through the decades that have passed since then”.
Excellence achieved in 1981, when the Racetrack hosts for the first time the Formula 1 Grand Prix of San Marino, considered one of the most spectacular races in the calendar of the F1 World Championship. So much so that according to a survey carried out by the International Automobile Federation (FIA) in 2005, 35% of fans in the world declared that their interest in Formula 1 was strictly connected to the presence of the “Enzo and Dino Ferrari” circuit in the Championship calendar. The evocative power of this name is now connected to a history of unforgettable sporting events that, in the collective imagination, erect the paradigm of the motor world. The organizational machine that supports the Racetrack continues to demonstrate remarkable innovative ability and a technical preparation of highest level.
In 1988, the “Drake” dies and the current name of the “Enzo e Dino Ferrari” Racetrack is attributed and increases the previous one, of 1968, which reported only the name of the son Dino who died prematurely.
From 1996 – and for the following three years – the Motomondiale returns to Imola with the City of Imola GP. In 2001, debuted the spectacular Superbike World Championship, which allows Imola to establish itself, once again, as the first circuit for great international motorcycle events.
On November 19th, 2006 at 16:14 o’clock, the old box part was demolished using 700 sticks of dynamite. 3.000 people crowded in an intense silence on the hill of Rivazza. The circuit and the annexed structures are in fact the subject of a redevelopment and modernization plan, which ended in September 2007 and been organized by the well-known german architect Hermann Tilke, expert in creation of motor racing circuits. The pit-building has been completely rebuilt: the new structure has 32 boxes (compared to the previous 18), a much more spacious paddock has been created and the new Race Control has been created which, designed according to the most modern criteria, houses offices, race management , timing room, speaker and a vip-lounge.
On March 6, 2008, the convention for the new thirty years management of the circuit been signed. The Municipality of Imola, owner of the plant, entrusts its management to Formula Imola S.p.A. which officially reopens the gates of the Racetrack on May 3rd with the event “Imola back on track”. Two days of great party in the name of music, sport, entertainment and gastronomy, attended by 38,000 people excited to be able to access all plant, now a symbol of the city. The inauguration of the track takes place with the World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) race in September of the same year.
However, the Imola Racetrack is not just motor racing. It becomes an important location for great concerts of world bands, such as AC\DC in 2015 and Guns N ‘Roses in 2017.
From the morphological point of view of the spaces and of the complementary physical structures, the circuit is at the forefront in terms of flexibility and functionality being able to host, in addition to speed racing competitions, also other motor sports events and not, musical and cultural events . The racetrack is also at the service of companies for various uses, first of them the vehicle tests of the most prestigious car and motorcycle manufacturers. The multi-purpose use of the circuit is in fact one of the most important drivers for the development of the Racetrack’s industrial plan, making it possible to make the most of the real estate, territorial and organizational assets that the complex expresses, to guarantee the surrounding environment thanks to revenue with continuity and programmability features.
Translated by Céline Alcala
Contacts
Enzo e Dino Ferrari International Racetrack
Formula Imola President: Uberto Selvatico Estense
General Manager: Roberto Marazzi
Press Office Manager: Marcello Pollini (marcello.pollini@autodromoimola.it)
Secretary: Maria Pia Rocca (info@autodromoimola.it); tel: +39 0542-655111
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