The Targa Florio: Sicily’s Legendary Road Race (with Richard Attwood)

Born in the hills of Sicily in 1906, the Targa Florio captured the imagination of drivers and fans for over seven decades. By the 1950s and 60s, it had become a cornerstone of the international motorsport calendar. Manufacturers like Porsche, Ferrari and Alfa Romeo threw their weight behind the race, seeing it as the ultimate test for their machines. As for the drivers, well, you’d need to speak to one to get a real sense of what it was like. And fortunately, that’s exactly what we’ve done! Ahead of our full interview with Richard Attwood (which will be released next Sunday), we asked him about his experiences of this epic race. 

The Birth of the Targa Florio

The Targa Florio was the brainchild of Vincenzo Florio, a Sicilian aristocrat with a fierce passion for cars and racing. Born into a wealthy family of industrialists, Florio had the means to create a race near his home of Palermo on the island of Sicily. While Europe already had its share of motor races, Florio wanted to bring something unique. His idea was simple yet bold: a road race that would run through the rugged and unforgiving Sicilian countryside.

Florio set his race in the mountainous Madonie region. The course wound through narrow, dusty roads, over sharp mountain passes, and through tiny villages, where crowds would gather inches away from the speeding cars.

The Course

Over the years there have been many Targa Florio configurations. The original 1906 route was 92 miles long, and a later version set the all-time mark for distance as a 670-mile circumnavigation of the entire island of Sicily. It should be noted that the 45 mile ‘Piccolo circuit’, which had been used since 1932, was no less dangerous than the previous iterations.

The Piccolo circuit boasted an astonishing 800-900 corners per lap. For context, most purpose-built circuits have just 12 to 18 corners, while the 13-mile Nürburgring—the world's longest purpose-built circuit—has about 180 corners.

Many manufacturers and entrants, especially those from outside Italy, would often bypass the Targa entirely. The daunting task of mastering the layout, coupled with doubts about their vehicles' ability to withstand the gruelling pace, deterred participation.

A Driver’s Perspective: Richard Attwood

We were fortunate to spend some time with Richard Attwood this week (full interview coming in next week's edition of The Apex), and I was keen to discuss his experiences of the Targa Florio. 

“The first time I did the Targa Florio with Porsche was in 1969.” He’d been selected by Huschke von Hanstein, head of Porsche’s racing department after a strong drive the previous year at Watkins Glen. 

Richard then described a meeting that took place in Stuttgart along with the other Porsche driver’s who were due to be competing.

Having never driven the course before, he asked, “I've actually never been to the Targa Florio, so… maybe you've got drivers who've been there and you can get somebody to replace me?” He then recounted their response in his best German accent, “Attwood, you will learn the Targa Florio”.  “I thought, hmm, okay. I've got the order then, haven't I?”, he laughed. 

The race was due to take place on the 4th May, so he drove down a few months before with fellow Porsche driver Brian Redman. They took two 911R’s and had 8 days to learn the 45 mile course. 

As it turned out, one of the biggest challenges was actually finding the course. 

“The first day we decided we'll just drive around the entire course and see how we get on. We each did it in our own cars, because if you're a passenger you don't really look, but if you're driving you’re more likely to take things in.

So we drove around, but every now and again we’d get to a fork in the road, and we didn't know which way to go, so we had to wait for a farmer to come along and ask, ‘The Targa Florio…which way does it go?’ 

We had to do that two or three times, and after at least a couple of hours, we got back to the start finish line, and we both opened the doors, we just collapsed on the floor with total laughter. There's absolutely no way we're going to learn that!”

Despite their best efforts to learn the course, the race itself didn’t go to plan. On Richard's last lap he hit a rain gully which damaged the suspension on the 908 he was driving, bringing an abrupt end to his race.

A year later Brian Redman had a nasty accident in what Richard believes to be a similar section of the track to his crash, and suffered severe burns to his face, neck and hands.

Due to the scale of the course and the seemingly non-existent communication between organisers and drivers, it took Richard and Gulf driver Pedro Rodriguez 12 hours to find the hospital that Brian had been airlifted to. 

When they arrived they found fellow racing driver Alain de Cadenet, who’d also had a nasty accident, assisting Brian with the not-so-glamorous task of going to the loo. “Alain obviously obliged in whatever way he could”, he chuckles.

Our full interview with Richard will be released next Sunday. 

The End of an Era

As motorsport evolved, the Targa Florio’s days were numbered. In an age where safety standards were becoming more stringent, the open-road nature of the race made it increasingly dangerous. By the early 1970s, the risks were too great to ignore. The roads were too narrow, the speeds too high, and the crowds too close. The fatal crashes that marred the later years of the event, including the death of two spectators in 1973, underscored the dangers of racing in such an environment.

That year, the Targa Florio was removed from the World Sportscar Championship calendar, signalling the end of its golden era. While the race continued as a national event for a few more years, it never regained its former glory. The final competitive Targa Florio was held in 1977, marking the end of one of motorsport’s most extraordinary chapters.