1954 Mille Miglia

The 1954 Mille Miglia (officially XXI Mille Miglia ), was a motor race open to Sports Cars, GT cars and Touring Cars. It was the 21st Mille Miglia and the third race of the 1954 World Sportscar Championship. The race was held on the public roads of Italy on 2 May 1954 using a route based on a round trip between Brescia and Rome, with the start and finish in Brescia. It was won by Alberto Ascari driving a Lancia D24.

As in previous year, the event this not strictly a race against each other, this is race against the clock, as the cars are released at one-minute intervals with the larger professional class cars going before the slower cars, in the Mille Miglia, however the smaller displacement slower cars started first. Each car number related to their allocated start time. For example, Giuseppe Farina’s car had the number 606, he left Brescia at 6:06am, while the first cars had started late in the evening on the previous day.

The previous August, Italian racing legend Tazio Nuvolari died. As a mark of respect, the route of this race, near it finish would pass through Mantua, where he was a resident.

A total of 483 cars were entered for the event, across nine classes based on engine sizes, ranging from up to 750cc to over 2.0 litre, for Grand Touring Cars, Touring Cars and Sport Cars. Of these, 378 cars started the event.

Fresh from their loss in Florida at the 12 Hours of Sebring, Lancia entered in force with four newly revised D24 cars, these were piloted by Piero Taruffi, Alberto Ascari, Eugenio Castellotti and Gino Valenzano. The cars were modified by race car designer Vittorio Jano. These enhancements featured an enlarge version of their V6 engine, so that could produce 265 bhp.

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