The complete SVZ file

[velocedoc]

Anyone know if Ada Pace was related to Carlos Pace the F1 driver in the 70's or a coincedence of having the same last name and a racing connection? BTW, this is a great thread. Amazes me where you folks find all of these photographs and history.

[curami]

Quote:

Originally Posted by velocedoc Anyone know if Ada Pace was related to Carlos Pace the F1 driver in the 70's or a coincedence of having the same last name and a racing connection? BTW, this is a great thread. Amazes me where you folks find all of these photographs and history.

[jaycee]

The badge on Ada pace's sprint on MM starting ramp is of the Milanese "Racing Club 19", formed by the original 19 racers.
It showed a steering wheel over a chequered background and a profile of a car at the lower edge, if I remember correctly. John deBoer may know more as his friend Beppe Bianchini was one who revived it some years ago. I have a lapel badge he gave me, I will try and photo it when I return home later this week.
Thanks AlfaRonny for the photos, very interesting!
Ada Pace is apparently alive and well at nearly 85 years of age living in some seclusion. She has many trophies and photographs but I am told access is pretty impossible, so maybe the stories and memories etc will never be told.
It seems a pity, as she had an interesting and varied career and had some difficulty at being accepted in the racing world especially when she won!
I guess it was difficult as a woman who could beat the men, although her results show winning the "femmes" classes, she often not only had class wins but OA's as well in racing on track, hillclimbs, rallies, in single seater, Osca,Fiat, Ferrari, Abarth as well as the various Alfas. Also very successful on two wheels with "sei giorni" vespa Scooters. Quite an amazing lady!

[jaycee]

Hi, Sorry, I've only just woken up and have brain damage!!!
Racing Club 19 was of course from Torino.

[jaycee]

Quote:

Originally Posted by velocedoc Anyone know if Ada Pace was related to Carlos Pace the F1 driver in the 70's or a coincedence of having the same last name and a racing connection? BTW, this is a great thread. Amazes me where you folks find all of these photographs and history.

[clemensh83]

Hi guys!

Referring to post 284 from Jaycee, why not open a new thread about Giulietta Sprint Veloce Allegeritas or go on at this thread I started some time ago:

http://www.alfabb.com/bb/forums/giul...iuliettas.html

My father owned a Allegerita for about 20 years, so I am very interested about these cars and could add some informations as well as pictures.

Regards Clemens

[AlfaRonny]

Here's a picture of Ada talking to Vincenzo Avorio "Ivanhoe" in the 1960 TF.
But since this is a thread on the SVZ, in the back is the car of "Ivanhoe"-Scarlatti, who finished 23th OA, 5th IC. Don't have s/n.
Ada Pace took part in the race with a #74 Osca S1100 entered by Racing Club 19 finishing 11th OA and 1st IC.

[ilvespino]

Ciao!
Some nice pictures of Ada Pace on my two websites Home page and La Storia.
Ciao Jaycee!

[iicarJohn]

I have done no specific further checking to verify or deny, but I have a note that indicates that, in 1954. "Ivanoe" was the racing pseudonym for Giancarlo Noceti who, like Vincenzo Avorio, was based in Roma. Entry lists and race results can be amazingly imprecise and then the edits created by journalists who might or might not "know better" can inject further imprecisions. Perhaps there was a "Vincenzo Avorio" as well as an "Ivanhoe Avorio"? I've met Ada Pace on a couple of occasions but none of the other folks mentioned. Ada is a very impressive personality! There is a wonderful account that she gave of her seeming slowness in practice runs, for hillclimbs in any case. Her practice times were slow because she said she "new how to go fast in the straight parts" and didn't push at all in those parts during practice. She worked on the turns and any other difficult parts during practice runs. Intentional or not, it gave some of her competitors a false sense of security until race time came! Eventually, some of the other racers learned not to trust her practice times as any kind of benchmark of her capabilities.


Checking for the other names throughout my computer I note the following:

Vincenzo Avorio was an early owner (pre-1954) of the Cisitalia 202L N. 503SC.

An Alfa Romeo 1900 Sprint was apparently raced in 1953 by "Avorio Ivanhoe"

At the 10 Ore Notturna Messinese in July of 1953, "Ivanhoe" and Noceti were entered in "Alfa Romeo 2000" with race #26. That would tend to argue that Noceti (if it was Giancarlo) was not "Ivanhoe" or "Ivanoe".

In 1954, an "Avorio" (we might assume, correctly or incorrectly, that it was Vincenzo Avorio?) shared a Fiat 8V with "Ivanoe" on the Giro di Sicilia. Noceti owned the Fiat 8V N. 000091 at the time, at least on paper. Not yet proof of any kind but this may lead us to some implied possibilities and/or an explanation as to why Noceti might have become confused as Avorio in somebody's mind? I fully acknowledge that it might be only myself who is currently confused.

In May of 1954, Giancarlo Noceti purchased the Alfa Romeo 1900 SSZ N. 01746. One or more "Avorio" did some racing in an Alfa Romeo 1900 Zagato. Do we begin to see a pattern here? In November of 1954, Giancarlo Noceti purchased yet another Alfa Romeo 1900 SSZ, AR1900C*01859. Now he maybe starts to look more like a dealer or middleman, perhaps for the Avorio family?

In April of 1956, Giancarlo Noceti purchased the Alfa Romeo Giulietta SV N. 01631

Late in 1960, Vincenzo Avorio purchased the SZ N. 00050 and it would seem that he very probably entered it in the 1961 Targa Florio either for or as "Ivanhoe" Avorio and Carlo Facetti was apparently listed as co-driver. Other notes indicate it was Buzzetti and Avorio-Sinibaldi in an SZ at the 1961 Targa Florio. There is a photo in The Autocar of 5 May, 1961 which I am not able to dig out of storage for a while to check.


The SVZ in the 1960 Targa Florio photo shared by AlfaRonny is 03907 which was previously owned from new by Sergio Pedretti ("Kim") and was rebodied by Zagato in 1958 for him. He raced it quite a number of times in 1958 and 1959. Data received in the 1980's from Lorenzo Boscarelli indicates that, after the Roma plate shown in the photo, it went on to get re-registered with yet another Roma plate but I have not yet researched it.

More to follow. At a minimum I will share an incomplete listing of Ada Pace racing history that can be built upon with a bit of effort and a bunch of additional time invested. Perhaps also a few other images of her in racing. Not all in Alfa Romeo I'm afraid.

John de Boer
The Italian Car Registry

[2000 touring sp]

t the 10 Ore Notturna Messinese in July of 1953, "Ivanhoe" and Noceti were entered in "Alfa Romeo 2000" with race #26.
Thanks for sharing you knowledge. Do you have more knowledge about this Alfa Romeo 2000. Was it the 2000 Sportivo ???

[curami]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 2000 touring sp t the 10 Ore Notturna Messinese in July of 1953, "Ivanhoe" and Noceti were entered in "Alfa Romeo 2000" with race #26. Thanks for sharing you knowledge. Do you have more knowledge about this Alfa Romeo 2000. Was it the 2000 Sportivo ???

[curami]

Quote:

Originally Posted by curami Ivanhoe-Amati were 8th OA and 1st IC in up to 2 litres GT, driving a Alfa Romeo 1900. The 2000 Sportiva was never entered in a race as well as the 2000 Sport, both now in Arese Museum.

[2000 touring sp]

curami: thank for clearing up. You confirms my impression. It was the statement with Alfa Romeo 2000, that puzzled me

[iicarJohn]

I'm sorry if the posting was unclear. I incorrectly assumed that readers would realize that the entry "Alfa Romeo 2000" implied "Alfa Romeo 1900".

In the entry, fifteen Alfa Romeo 1900 cars are shown as entries but only two are actually listed as "Alfa Romeo 1900". Thirteen are listed more generically, twelve as "Alfa Romeo 2000" and one as "Alfa 2000", reflecting the class limit. Similarly, ten Ferrari are shown on the entry. Two are listed as "Ferrari 3000", two are listed as "Ferrari 2000" and six are listed as "Ferrari oltre 2000". This implies that, if an Alfa Romeo 6C2500 had been entered, it might have been listed as "Alfa Romeo oltre 2000". However, there are two "Lancia 2500" also listed. Additionally, there are five "Lancia 2000" listed. Of course, we all know by now that entry lists rarely communicate the actual final list of participants, both cars and human? And, once the race is finished and protests are sometimes lodged, and certain cars are judged to comply or perhaps not comply with the rules of the category (in this case "GT" versus "Sport"), some "GT" entries, if not disqualified completely, might actually be judged to have finished in the "Sport" category. I can't say that any of this happened in this case as I've not made a study.

Edit: I should add that there was also a "Turismo" category.

[iicarJohn]

Sassi-Superga hillclimb 25 ottobre 1953. I don't recall now if it was Ada who told me that the Sassi-Superga 1954 was her first race. I have not found a record of her on the hillclimb in 1954, but I do have these photos of her on the 1953 event in a Moretti. She was 4th in the Turismo Internazionale 750 category in 5'33". I've not yet learned the chassis number. Only one other similar car was on the event, chassis N. 841, and it was 7th in the same category in 5'58.8", driven by "Merlo", perhaps Fortunato Merlo. The class winner was a Renault that did the climb in 5'02.8". The Moretti of Merlo was registered as a "Moretti 600" and it seems quite likely that Ada's car was also "600" but I have to acknowledge that the size declarations of Moretti cars were sometimes a bit at odds to what appears to have been reality. So, although we can presume that these were monoalbero engines (Turismo Internazionale), we really don't know yet what the engine sizes actually were. Something below 750cc in any case.

As an aside, I have the very much rarer and far sexier "berlinetta 750 Mille Miglia" bialbero car numbered 823 but without the original engine, as found by my father Jarl. Each of the few photos I've found of the car has a different description of engine size. I am currently going with the "750" number that appears on a factory sales sheet as noted above in quotation marks. Interestingly, Moretti showed 750 bialbero engines beginning 1948 but it seems that it took until 1952 to actually get one into a functioning car.