The Bernina Gran Turismo mountain race route is certainly one of the most beautiful and interesting of all. The Bernina Pass in the canton of Graubünden connects the Swiss Engadine in the north with the Italian Valtellina in the south. From La Rösa (1871 meters above sea level) to the top of the pass, the winding but very well-built road runs for 5.7 km up to 2330 meters.
The fastest cars managed this in less than 3.5 minutes in the race runs on September 16, 2023, which corresponds to an average of just under 100 km/h, despite hairpin bends and many curves.
Dependent on the weather
Time and again, however, the organizers of the hill climb, which has been taking place for many years as part of the International St. Moritz Automobile Week, play a trick on the weather, as was the case on 16 and 17 September 2023.
While everything was still fine early in the morning on Saturday and the sun started to rise, clouds of fog soon drifted up the Bernina, reducing visibility to just a few meters.
Fortunately, all four training and race runs could be completed on Saturday according to the program, but the temperatures were cool and the wind made it feel even colder.
Things got even worse on Sunday, so that after a few delays only one more race was possible.
Diverse starting field
There was no lack of variety among the just over 50 racing and touring cars on the grid. Although the Alfa Romeo and Porsche brands were particularly well represented with eight cars each, there were at most a handful of cars from the other brands, some of them only one.
The spectrum ranged from 1950s racing sports cars such as the Maserati A6CGS/53 Fantuzzi from 1956 to the modern Pininfarina Battista electric hyper sports car, which you definitely can't hear the speed.
Many rarities made the hearts of the spectators beat faster and there was also plenty of humor, for example when a Mercedes-Benz 300 SL Roadster with skiing equipment thundered up the mountain.
There was also plenty on offer acoustically: in addition to a twelve-cylinder engine, there were many eight-cylinder and even more four-cylinder engines to be heard, but six-cylinder engines were also well represented. At the latest, when the Ford Galaxie 500 roared away, you got goose bumps just listening to it.
The variety of shapes was also great, ranging from the early Lotus Seven Series 1 to the elegant AC Ace or Lister Jaguar to the BMW M1 or Porsche 964 Speedster.
Anyone who remembers previous editions of Bernina Gran Turismo will have noticed that both single-seaters and pre-war vehicles were conspicuous by their absence. That was a shame, because in the past they offered additional variety and a splash of color, and a Bugatti fits very well on the Bernina Pass road. But there were no cars older than 1950 in the 2023 event.
Porsche 908/3 fastest
The winner in the racing category was the Porsche 908/3. In view of its fighting weight of 545 kg, combined with an engine output of 350 hp, which the beautiful-sounding eight-cylinder boxer engine churns out at 8400 rpm, this open two-seater sports car could certainly be considered the favorite.
His best time was 3:26.232.
The fact that the Shelby Cobra 427 S/C came within just over two seconds of him was actually the bigger surprise.
Third place went to the Nissan Skyline GT-R, which lost around 3.6 seconds to the Porsche.
A Porsche 911 S crossed the finish line in 4th place, followed by the fast Lotus Elan 26R, an Alfa Romeo 1750 GT Am and the brute-sounding TVR Griffith 400.
The top ten was completed by a Ford Mustang V8 and the Lister Jaguar.
The other "Competition" drivers (with starting numbers 1 to 15) were followed by Aston Martin DB2/4 Mk1 Bertone, Porsche 911 and Jaguar XK 120 SE.
Evenly matched in the majority
The majority of the field belonged to the regularity category.
The aim here was to maintain the same time as consistently as possible on several hill climbs. The results of this category will be added here later.
And then there were the demo drivers, who were on the road with mostly modern, but also some historic vehicles.
Jost Wildbolz concluded the event in his Austin Cooper, which we were particularly pleased to see, as he embodies around 50 years of historic racing tradition.
Note: The participating vehicles are documented in over 250 pictures in the additional picture gallery.
-c-Erik-Fuller-Courtesy-RM-Auctions.jpg)