Today we think of Fiat’s role in Grand Prix racing as the owner of Ferrari, but the Turin company was once a successful pacesetter in the sport in its own right. Using radical new designs, it transformed Grand Prix technology.
Both spectacular and practical, the test track atop FiatÕs five-storey Lingotto factory was an architectural coup.
Fiat had a good First World War. It helped that Italy was on the winning side. Rejecting her initial alliance with Germany and Austria-Hungary and attracted by the offer of post-war territorial gains, Italy joined the French and British Entente Powers in 1915. Only in her northwest corner was Italian territory occupied during the war. Although Austro-Hungarian troops forced an incursion, they were thrown back in the battle of Vittorio Veneto, belying the Italian image of an ineffectual military.
In this era, before strategic bombing, the Fiat factories in Turin were free to work flat-out during the war on materiel for the fighting forces. Before the war, Giovanni Agnelli had bolstered Fiat’s position by adding ancillary enterprises that included Riv, to make ball bearings, and joint-venture steel mills. The Turin company’s product portfolio extended into aircraft, ships and railways. With Fiat car production outgrowing its Corso Dante factory, a new plant at Lingotto was designed by Giacomo Mattè-Trucco. He gave Fiat an epic five-story manufactory with a test track on its roof (shown here).
