From 1953 to 1972, the Piacenza Automobile Club (CPAE) organized 17 editions of the Castell’Arquato – Vernasca uphill speed race. The event was initially created as a minor provincial competition.
The 8.9 km uphill route developed with different characteristics, the first part 5 km, of straight road, while the final part made up of 34 curves, most of which were hairpin turns. At the first edition, 40 starters, Alfa Romeo participated with the driver Consalvo driving a splendid 3000CM. Since 1994 the CPAE has been organizing the re-enactment with a regularity competition, the main event for fans from Piacenza and its surroundings who want to compete with stopwatches. Since 1996 it has also begun to organize the Vernasca Silver Flag which retraces the same route on a closed road of the past but with the formula of a dynamic conservation and restoration competition for racing cars.
Over the years this event has brought the most important collectors of racing cars to the Val d’Arda, allowing the public present to welcome cars of all types including Formula 1 to Vernasca, and allowing our club to make itself known by winning the ASI prizes from 2004 to today, winning the International Historic Motorsport Award Speed Event of the Year in 2005 and receiving in 2011 the nomination by the English magazine Octane for Motorsport Event of The Year, being beaten by the Goodwood Festival.
This year the appointment is from 21-23 June.
