Nearly every modern car hits the Nurburgring during its development before the production begins as the automakers are constantly trying to make their products better and better. The most-demanding track in the world is also a place where enthusiasts can put their rides and their own driving skills to the limits and see how fast they can lap the circuit. You would probably think old cars, especially ones built before World War 2, are not nearly as fun as their modern successors but that’s completely wrong.
A new video by the Auto Addiction channel on YouTube takes us to the Nurburgring to show us a selection of vintage cars lapping the legendary track. The video creates a lovely mixture of sounds and pictures and shows some of the best machines from a century ago in action. Or, put alternatively, from the times when the passenger was required for ballast.
From single-seaters to two-seat roadsters and many more – there’s something for everyone in this video. We are struggling to recognize all of the vehicles (you can leave a note with your favorite one in the comments section below), but we see cars from Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Alfa Romeo, Rolls-Royce, Bugatti, and more.
Around the 1:30-minute mark, you can see the safety car patiently chasing a vintage car probably trying to let the driver know the vehicle is leaking gasoline. And if some of these cars sound a lot like old planes to you, there’s an easy explanation for this phenomenon. Many really old cars used engines inspired or very similar to – in some cases even actual – airplane engines. Just detuned for the purposes of a four-wheeled land vehicle.
The journey in time continues with several cases in which there’s an actual competition between the filmed cars. At the end of the video, there’s even an example of the Locomobile – a rare vehicle that is now more than 100 years old. We can’t tell the exact model of this vehicle but it’s quite possibly the loudest vehicle in the world. A glorious end of an epic video!
