Achille’s last stand
Tazio Nuvolari is regarded as one of legendary figures in Italian motorsport, but there was a time when his fellow countryman Achille Varzi matched him for success on motorcycles
Achille Varzi was born on August 8, 1904 and had two brothers. His father, Menotti Varzi, was an industrialist based in Galliate, who had made fortune with his large co-owned Manifattura Rossari e Varzi textile plant. He also was an Italian senator.
Like Nuvolari, Achille became acquainted with motorcycles at a young age. Several Frera motorcycles were used by salesmen in his father’s business, sidecars included. The third wheel made it easy for young Achille to get the hang of motorised power – but a soon as he could reach the ground with his feet, he quickly learned how to ride the solo Freras to their limits. His brothers Angioletto and Anacleto happily joined him and their father was their biggest supporter.
Achille got his Italian racing licence at the age of 18 in 1922, and from the outset he was a very stylish rider with an immaculate dress sense – a wool turtleneck sweater, leather knickerbocker pants, leather boots and a Macedonia cigarette virtually omnipresent in his mouth or hand.
A sensation from the start, he rode in 16 of the 20 races that made up the 1923 350cc Italian national championship – 12 with his Garelli 350 Super Sport and four on an AJS 350. He finished second in the first race of the season at the Circuito di Rapallo and three weeks later scored his first victory at the Circuito di Perugia. Seven race wins later, he was crowned Italian national champion, an amazing result for a 19-year-old youth among a field of rugged motorcycle racing veterans. To everyone’s astonishment, the rookie Achille also rode a Norton M18 to sixth place in the Italian 500cc Grand Prix at Monza.
Varzi planned to raced his M18 in the 1924 season, but after victory in the Spanish 500cc GP of Catalonia, he was offered a contract with Frera for the Italian 500cc championship that year. One of Italy’s biggest motorcycle manufacturers, with some 5000 employees in their factory complex in Tradate, between Milan and Varese, Frera expected results – but after a solitary podium (third at the Salita della Merluzza hillclimb) and DNFS in all other early season races, they terminated his contract prematurely.
Frustrated, Varzi travelled to the Isle of Man TT, where
he had been offered a ride by Dot. While Nuvolari steered clear of the Island, considering the course too long for a non-local to learn, Varzi raced the TT seven times between 1924 and 1928 – but his debut was fraught. He took evasive action and hit a wall when a rider crashed right in front of him, but this earned him the Nisbet Shield, a reward for fair play. Returning to Italy, he was offered a lucrative contract by the Italian Sunbeam importer, for whom he scored four race victories in the Italian national 500cc championship class to finish his season on a high. Achille remained with Sunbeam in 1926, but only won one of the 13 races he started in that year – at the Circuito del Novara on July 5. He retired in eight other championship races that year. In June he returned to the Isle of Man, retiring with his Sunbeam in the 350 race, but in the Senior he finished eighth. It earned him the Visitors Cup, handed out by Motor Cycling magazine to the best foreign rider.
From that point, Varzi rapidly emerged as Italy’s top rider. After a rather disappointing 1925 racing season, he again focused on winning the 500cc Italian championship for Sunbeam in 1926, with Tazio Nuvolari focusing on the 350cc championship. Both riders had fierce competition from Italy’s top riders of that era, such as Miro Maffeis, Ugo Prini, Umberto Faraglia, Mario Saetti, Ernesto Gnesa and brothers Pietro and Mario Ghersi. Nevertheless, Varzi dominated the 500cc Italian championship, wining six of the eight races. He finished second and third in the other two races – enough for Varzi to clinch the 500cc national title. In an excellent season, he also rode his 500cc Sunbeam to victory in the Targa Florio and won the 500cc Grand Prix of Nations at Monza on September 19 of that year, too. Suitably impressed with his 1926 racing season, Moto Guzzi duly offered him a works contract for 1927.
Varzi managed to finish second in the 500cc class of the 1926 Circuito del Lario race on his Sunbeam, while Nuvolari
‘VARZI RAPIDLY EMERGED AS ITALY’S TOP RIDER FROM 1926’
rode his Bianchi Freccia Celeste to victory in the 350cc race at the same mountainous lakeside circuit. Tazio also won the 350cc Grand Prix of Nations at Monza and, after having scored seven 350cc victories in the Italian national championship series, he secured the 350cc title. Nuvolari and Varzi’s 1926 racing seasons had been equally successful – yet in different classes.
Varzi’s 1927 debut season as a Guzzi works rider was quite disastrous. The factory had won the inaugural 500cc European Championship in 1924 with the C 4V ohc fourvalve single. But by 1927 the design, which hailed back to Guzzi’s ‘GP’ prototype of 1919, was no longer competitive. Varzi retired in all 500cc Italian championship races. In the 250cc class it went better, with the much more competitive 250cc ohc two-valve single works racer that debuted on the circuits in 1926. On May 8, Varzi took his first victory on a Guzzi when he won the Circuito del Savio race, followed on June 15 by a magnificent fifth place at the Isle of Man Lightweight TT – his best Isle of Man TT result.
Like Nuvolari, Varzi turned to cars and when Nuvolari established his own team, he persuaded Varzi to join him. After relations between the two quickly soured, Varzi went his own way, buying an Alfa Romeo and running it himself. Fittingly, in July, Varzi won his last motorcycle race – the 500cc Moto Club d’italia Grand Prix, on a Sunbeam.
Varzi would start in a total of 139 car races, winning 33 of them. Most victories were in GPS, but he also won the 1934 Mille Miglia and the Targa Florio in 1930 and ’34. He lost his life during practice for the 1948 Swiss Grand Prix after crashing his Alfa at a wet but drying Bremgarten circuit. Ironically, it was only his second racing crash. His death shocked the racing world and, as a reflection of his fame, his funeral was attended by some 15,000 people.