Past Imperfect: Rosemeyer - a 1930s German legendBernd Rosemeyer was a legend in his own lifetime. Acknowledged as one of the world's greatest racing drivers and married to a great German aviator, Elly Beinhorn, Rosemeyer and his wife excited huge interest wherever they went.
Driving for Auto Union, he won the 1937 Donington Grand Prix at the end of the 1937 racing season in his rear-engine car over his Mercedes rivals. His thoughts then turned to record-breaking and the special Record Week, which was organised by the governing body of German motor sport, the Oberste Nationale Sportbehorde für Deutsche Kraftfahrt, and was to take place along the Frankfurt-Darmstadt autobahn at the end of October.
Rosemeyer was determined to be the first man to exceed 400km/h (250mph) on the road, and trial runs were made on the Halle-Leipzig autobahn. Almost immediately he achieved his aim, with a run exceeding 400km/h. Auto Union now wheeled out a second streamlined car fitted with a 4.3-litre engine in which Rosemeyer set new records at 406km/h. Meanwhile, rivals Mercedes-Benz was having serious problems with its record car, which was experiencing front-end lift at speed. The result was a triumph for Auto Union and its driver, and a whole new set of records.
New Year 1938 brought news that rivals Mercedes-Benz had modified its record car and had requested another series of record attempts on the autobahn. Auto Union felt it needed to respond. Auto Union believed it could increase the record car's speed by as much as 30km/h and so it was decided to return to the Frankfurt-Darmstadt autobahn once more.
On January 28th, 1938, Mercedes-Benz driver Rudi Caracciola broke Rosemeyer's record with his first run in the revised Mercedes-Benz car. By 11am, Rosemeyer was almost ready to go, and congratulated Caracciola on his record-breaking run. On his first run - an average of two runs, one in each direction - he hit 432.44km/h, complaining that the engine was not running hot enough. Part of the radiator was blanked off and he set out on another run.
Motoring posts were set up at kilometre intervals along the course and word came back from the 9km post that Rosemeyer had crashed. His colleagues found his body lying under nearby trees, his car having apparently been blown across the road while travelling at 430km/h and putting two wheels on the grass. Today, Rosemeyer is remembered much as Ayrton Senna is remembered by a later generation - a supreme practitioner of the art of motor racing.