BMW Classic celebrates 75 years since the legendary BMW 328 completed the Mille Miglia long-distance event. BMW Classic has signed up six BMW 328 models for this year’s event, once again demonstrating the close ties that bind the BMW brand to the epic Mille Miglia. One of the cars is being driven by Alexander Bilgeri and BMW collector Scott Hughes who are representing the US side of the BMW team in Italy.
The event, now a reliability trial, starts on May 14, 2015 in the north Italian city of Brescia and will cover more than 1,600 kilometres (1,000 miles).
A photo map of the event can be found at www.bmwmille.com.
The teams competing in the BMW 328 swept the top spots in the 2.0-litre category in 1938, and secured its famous overall victory just two years later. Following the Mille Miglia’s switch in format, Giuliano Cané and his wife Lucia Galliani took the car across the finish line in Brescia to a second victory in 2004. With that victory, the BMW 328 Mille Miglia Touring Coupé became the first car to ever win both the classic race event and the new version of the Mille Miglia for historic automobiles.
The field of BMW 328 models will surely please classic car enthusiasts, as BMW Group Class plans to dispatch six teams in the 2015 Mille Miglia. This year’s cars include the BMW 328 Berlin-Rom Touring Roadster, the BMW 328 Mille Miglia Roadster, and four additional BMW 328 models.
The Mille Miglia was first held in 1927 and was soon rated as the world’s greatest motor sport challenge. Up until 1957, the cars drove on public highways and narrow urban streets, and partly also along unsurfaced roads. The event was revived in a new format in 1977, and has since been staged as a 1,000-mile reliability and regularity trial. A total of 438 historic vehicles have registered for the 2015 Mille Miglia. This year’s round trip will be carried out over four days, commencing from the traditional starting point on May 14, 2015, and ending on May 17, 2015, when competitors will race towards Brescia, where the first cars are expected to arrive around midday.
Here is also a video of the BMW 328 in Brescia:
