Celebrating One of the World's First Hillclimbs

Chanteloup les Vignes, a little to the west of Paris, held one of the first hillclimbs ever held in the world on 27 November 1898.  They claim it was the first but at least one other site in France claims to have held one in 1897 (*see bottom of the blogpost).  Whatever, it is a charming location that still commemorates this historic occasion with some demo runs up the hill.   The original course was 1,782 metres but nowdays the re-run is over a hill that is 900 metres long.   There are many cars that take part that are Pre-Second World War and there are more modern cars and also motor bikes as well.   A fun little event that this year was on Sunday 15th June.

A Barré exits the second corner and makes the climb up the Chanteloup hill

One of the vehicles to climb the hill was none other than a Solex!  Keep pedalling hard!

A somewhat faster two wheeled machine

This Yamaha entertained us with a wheelie!

A Volvo P1800 takes the flag at the start

A Facel Vega takes the first corner

Lancia Fulvia soon after the start

Alfa Romeo enters the second corner

A Hurtu exits the second corner

Perhaps my favourite car of the day, a pre-war Simca-Fiat Berlinette Le Mans

An MG enters corner three

Vintage car passes equally beautiful house on the exit of turn three

A Delehaye in turn four

Further up the hill

A fun little car

Bugatti T35 makes the climb

A rather modern Renault powered single seater

Ford GT40

A Sports Racing Car makes a rapid ascent

Which we hqd earlier seen having an interview in the paddock

Healey Silverstone gets to the top of the hill

As does this Porsche

Monument celebrating the first event at the top of the hill

Thanks to the town of Chanteloup Les Vignes for an enjoyable afternoon

For those interested, the first Chanteloup hillclimb in 1898 had over 50 participants and was won by Jenatzy in an electric car at just over 28 kph.   Amazing how it is only now again in the 21st century that we race electric cars again.  Watching the older cars run today made one realize just how challenging hillclimbs were for cars back in the early days of racing.  Jenatzy of course also drove the first road vehicle to go over 100 Kph and he achieved that in nearby Acheres.

Wonderful character driving a wonderful Hispano-Suiza

* Historical footnote:  Chanteloup lers Vignes appears to have a claim to have held the first hill climb that was held as a separate event.  La Turbie had a hill climb in January1897 but this was part of the Marseilles-Nice-La Turbie 240km event.   Interestingly, the Marseilles-Nice-La Turbie race was won by none other than Count Gaston de Chasseloup  Laubat, the great rival of Camille Jenatzy who won the Chanteloup event.  I  note that some lists of hillclimbs list Charles River Park near Boston, USA as having had a hill climb just before the original Chantloup runs in November 1998.  However, this was not a Course de Cotes or Speed Hillclimb as we would know it today as it was more a test to see if cars could negotiate specially constructed wooden ramps of varying gradients.