To The Mountains
SUPERCARS DRIVERS ‘LOUNGE
TO THE MOUNTAINS
Words by Richi Mackie / Words by Luke Stackpoole
With this new issue, we are launching one of the many new columns that will enrich Auto Class’ pages in the coming months. On our website there is a section called “Supercars Lounge”, so we decided to expand it and not just talk about supercars. In this column it will be a bit like having a chat all together, we will take inspiration from the many e-mails that arrive at the office and from what you like to read and therefore emotions, characters, curiosities from the automotive world and everything that can always bring closer to our desks the real fuel of each article, your passion.
Are we talking about adventures then? A few days ago I was at the restaurant with a group of friends I met as I started university near Lugano. Good people, with the heads on their necks and a lot of spirit of sacrifice. Boys like me who were working the summer and then halved their efforts once they were coming back to university and for some of them the fruits of so many efforts turned into the possibility of being able to realize a dream and buy a car coveted for so long. I’m not necessarily talking about supercars with six zeroes in their price tag, but cars that are equally capable of drawing a wide smile on their face. That evening we were finishing a relaxed dinner that tasted like a simple repatriation, when between a road trip story and the other, we decided we had to gather everyone and take our cars on a mountain pass not too far from where we usually meet. Everyone has his commitments however, and it seemed really impossible to find a useful date, so while we were preparing for an almost inexorable yield, one of them came out “Let’s go now, I’ve never driven on a mountain pass in heart of the night”. That said, a couple of hours later we were at the bottom of the Sustenpass, one of the most beautiful mountain pass in Switzerland. We stopped for a few minutes out of the village of Wassen and enjoyed a few moments of silence. An almost surreal calm was interrupted only by the muttering of some engine, all around it was dark and the headlights of our cars barely lit a few meters ahead.
Time to go and we immersed ourselves in one of the most exceptional experiences of our life, something very simple that came about by pure chance and without any ambition, but which contributed to consolidating our bond. Because in the end it is always a matter of touching the right keys and driving on a mountain pass in the middle of the night, without coming across a living being and feeling part of that majestic place, it was really something indescribable and I recommend it to each of you. That time I realized that it is not always necessary to plan things, but often the most unexpected ones are those that are still able to amaze us. In a digital period in which everything is always at hand, one of the sensations that is able to reinvigorate our spirit is precisely that of improvising, leaving the routine and heading into the unexpected. And then, let’s face it, when oversteer dedicated sports cars and a road like this are involved, everything comes simpler as well.