For the series: find the differences (with today). Simple: there were a lot of motorbikes! Even a 500, the best in terms of performance and technology available, could be bought from the dealer. Try to imagine if today a private rider could buy a MotoGP! The fact is that 30 raced in the Italian championship, and there was the possibility of not qualifying. An amateur could feel like a champion, and when it happened, if finances allowed, even compete in a world championship. A Becheroni was compared in national races with champions like Lucchinelli and Uncini, and in the Italian GP with people like Sheene and Roberts. And it was like this not only in 500, but also in the lower classes, which also had their own specialists. Figure now disappeared: today we start from Moto3 to move on to Moto2 and then finish in MotoGP. Where, however, places are very limited, and therefore there’s the risk of ending your career there, or at the very least, recycling yourself in Superbike, if it goes well, or minor categories. At the risk of appearing nostalgic, I would venture to say that then the sporting element was much more present and important than today. The “Sunday” driver ran for passion and was a true protagonist. I am thinking, for example, of poor Guido Paci: by profession… a pilot, but as a fighter in the Air Force, and as a hobby as well, with motorbikes and bobsleds. He was very fast, so much so that Honda Italia put him under contract, entrusting him with one of the RS500Rs derived from the world championship bike the previous year with Spencer. Which he painted pink, his color. Paci was completely bald, had a Tartar mustache and was very fast, so much so as to frighten the officials of the world championship. A true character, whose career unfortunately ended, together with his life, at the Imola 200 Miles forty years ago, betrayed by that very important bike while he was fighting for second place with Lucchinelli and Uncini. The Italian Championship races were hard-fought, even RAI was aware of it and sometimes there was even live TV for the most prestigious appointments.
After 1985, with the victory of Franco Uncini, the Italian 500 Championship drops in prestige and participants, being disputed in recent years in a single trial at Vallelunga, but the roll of honor includes names of all respect, such as those of Biliotti , Chili and Papa.
When I see world championship grids with 22 bikes, I can’t help but think back to when as a kid I read reports of national 500 races with 30/40 bikes at the “Go!”; and riders like Becheroni, like Paci and like Ekerold, heroes of a motorcycling that made you dream.
