There are stories stolen from the archives to remember. I arrive the next day and I don't care about the appropriate anniversary, because emotions have no expiration date, they can't be organized in an editorial chat, they just exist. A bit like you, Lella. Forgive this confidence that I take to tell you, but distances, in this case, are of no benefit to anyone.
I met you by chance many years ago, wandering as a passenger in that province of Alessandria that still smells of the plains, without the enchantment of Monferrato, without the magical gateway that constitutes the Ligurian Apennines. You were there while I hoped to meet someone, a pitiful excuse for not admitting that I was wandering in search of my identity. Dad at the wheel took me to places of the soul.
Then Frugarolo, the memory: “Lella Lombardi was born here, the only woman to score half a point in F1.". And my teenage self was already ready to fantasize about this incredible girl, who drove the cars I loved so much. The journey continues with my thirst for answers, but Wikipedia didn't exist, the web was a chimera, so I rely on my father's memories.
“It was 1975, Spanish Grand Prix. City track, messy, full of accidents. I remember that the riders didn't want to race. At that time, doubts about safety began.” I reflected, almost stunned, understanding without fully understanding why Ayrton had recently died and I had shivers thinking about other incidents from distant times. “Were there any deaths?” I asked with my heart in my mouth.
“Some spectators, I don't remember well. Injured pilots.” I, happy until a few moments before, knowing that a woman had asserted herself, suddenly became dark. My F1 Was it such a demanding sport? Memories of mythology came back to me, sacrificial altars, heavy thoughts that I couldn't give names to. “So, how did it end?”
“There was a German driver, Stommelen I think, he had a crazy accident. The guard rails weren't enough, the crazy car ran over people, four or five people. The race was then stopped. Thanks to the many retirements, including the Ferraris, Jones and Hunt, there were few cars left in the race. Lella thus arrived in seventh position, the last to which points could be awarded. But since the match stopped halfway, the score was halved.”
I lived my day, seeing the little boy who made my heart beat, eating the zucchini omelette he had prepared for me. But I kept thinking about Lella. In the following days I looked for traces of his story, which incredibly had intertwined with mine in a sweet October of the nineties.
![Lella Lombardi](https://www.formulacritica.it/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Lella-Lombardi-1-750x375.webp)
Every time I saw a truck I thought of her driving fast and safely across the Apennines, transporting the tasty meats from the family butcher's shop. “You see that great ambitions are nourished by normal things, I told myself“. I remembered her on the karts of the time, infernal machines to which she devoted herself to continue living her dream. And, after that, the F3, the Formula 850, the Formula Ford, a long sequence up to the debut in F1 in 1974. Then that 1975 which consecrated it to memory, with the famous half point which my father praised.
Almost thirty years have passed since that trip to Piedmont with dad, since the discovery of Lella. The articles, the books have arrived, my thirst for engines is satisfied without problems thanks to the web. Yet I have those memories in my mind, lost in the October countryside, between the gold of autumn and the grape harvests. That F1 that had taken the immense Senna from me was trying to win me back with an intrepid woman.
Lella was strong without underlining it, a pioneer without claiming it, a rainbow long before certain struggles were cleared through customs. His example reconciled me with a world that, to this day, plays a role of primary importance in my life. After meeting her I went back to watching F1 in a more conscious way, to become passionate about it again, little by little, as befits every rebirth.
Crediti foto: F1