The Pikes Peak International Hill Climb is an American race event held every summer, after the mountain's snow has melted, in Cascade near Colorado Springs. The race takes place on a 20km road that winds up the 4000 m summit of Pikes Peak, the second highest mountain in the Colorado Rockies.
The race starts in a wooded picnic area at 1500 m and ascends up the mountain at a gradient of 10 percent. The finish line at the mountain’s summit is well above the tree-line. A series of wide winding roads and countless switchbacks, hairpins (about 156 turns) and very few straight sections make up the course. For a large part, the air is noticeably thinner with lower oxygen levels and consequently has serious effects on both machines (loss of power, so a turbocharger is needed) and their pilots (muscle fatigue and impair mental function).
After practice sessions are wrapped-up, racers only get one shot at the course on sunday, leading to the event being described as: “the art of producing the perfect performance.” The standing record at the time when Audi Sport got interested in racing in Colorado was a 11:38.300, logged in 1983, set by Al Unser, Jr. piloting an open-wheel V8 Woziwodzki Wells Coyote Chevy racer. His brother, Bobby Unser had already nine victories here. Was Pikes Peak “Unser – mountain ?”.
The Audi Sports Quattro S1
Audi Sport’s high-profile French driver Michèle Mouton (second in the 1982 world Rally championship) had taken her first run at the Pike’s Peak in 1984. She could have won it but some engine issues did make her lose power during critical moments of the climb. She’d managed a 12:10.38-minute run, 17 seconds slower than she’d achieved in testing but more than 10 seconds faster than John Buffum’s best-yet run in a long-wheelbase quattro in 1983. That performance had been enough for a second overall ranking and a class win. For Audi of America, the 1984 class victory triggered a hype and was good for public relations boon.
So, when Michèle Mouton returned to the Pikes’s Peak in the summer of 1985, she had some unfinished business there. She was even more determined not only to win but to take Al Unser Jr’s record at the same time.
She now had the short wheelbase Audi Sport quattro S1 E2 Group B, the Walter Röhrl chassis from the Corsica rally. The S1 E2 was homologated July 1, just days before Pike’s Peak race week. which Mouton used in her world championships rally. (Chassis Rohrl Corsica). The car used the aluminum block 5-cylinder turbocharged engine developed around 500 hp and 354 lb.-ft of torque at 8000 rpm in race trim. Weighing in at just 1090 kg the S1 E2 was capable of 1-100 km/h mph just 3.1 seconds. The Audi factory had worked a lot on electrics an the reaction of the engine on the high altitude. No paddle shifts at that time, but a manual clutch.
Audi team boss Roland Gumpert outlined some of the improvements to the press ahead of the race. Notably, the team had used more lightweight titanium and Kevlar components to shed over 45 pounds. They’d also completely overhauled the Bosch Motronic fuel injection system that had caused the problems the previous year, setting improved parameters for the thin air and erratic weather they’d come to expect. Turbo boost had been increased to 1.8 bar and output had also raised to about 500 hp. A smaller 30-liter aluminum tank replaced the rally car’s 80-liter unit since a short run up a big mountain required far less fuel reserves. The ’85 S1 was also utilizing new Michelin tires fitted to BBS modular alloys that Audi of America’s rallying efforts had adopted.
Mouton had run the previous year with her WRC partner Fabrizia Pons riding shotgun in order to more quickly adapt to the 156 turns. Without Fabrizia, the car would be lighter, and she could travel at a faster pace. Besides, Roland Gumpert had done the math on the previous year’s run, estimating that without Fabrizia in the car they’d have probably scored an overall victory.
Pre-race troubles for Mouton
Life was made difficult for Mouton because as far as the organizers were concerned, she was going too fast “The organisers made my life very complicated. It was like it was the first time they saw a rally car or a turbocharged car – even a European or a woman! They caught me speeding on the practice starts by 5mph and put me before a small tribunal saying, ‘You are like a criminal, you’ve been speeding, you could have killed my children’”. She was fined $500. In the second practice day, the stewards’ collected nose was further out of joint when she launched her Audi quattro Sport into a practice start with spinning wheels in order to put some heat in it, and unwittingly sprayed nearby marshals in gravel and debris. She was immediately banned from driving anywhere other than on the hill itself and got another fine of 500 dollars. That meant she would forfeit a flying start. Instead, her quattro would be pushed to the line by the Audi team. She had to jump in herself, do the safety belts. The car would have to be in neutral when the green flag dropped and only then could she select first gear and proceed. Mouton: “They knew my time from the practice and didn’t want me to win, so they find something they believe really can be a big penalty.” It left Michèle Mouton angry and frustrated. It was hard to imagine that one of the Unser’s family could ever have received a fine.
Of the situation, Michèle would later say to the press, “Both incidents were really harmless. I don’t understand how you could make such drama of it. But not everyone was happy that we had come back to Pike’s Peak. A European car that drives circles around the competition, and with a woman at the wheel – that went against the grain of some people. With these games they probably wanted to make our lives difficult, wanted to prevent us from being so successful again. Not with me though. If you put pressure on me, I will only become stronger. That was the biggest motivation for me.”
Supportive of her concerns, Audi Sport called a large press conference where she made her case to the assembled journalists, arguing that her safety was just as important. In the aftermath, race organizers offered two concessions. They offered to give the fine money to charity and agreed that she could stay in the car and be belted in, but she wasn’t allowed to put the car in gear. Her mechanics would literally have to push the Sport quattro up to the starting line.
In the meantime, Michèle Mouton never missed a beat. She knocked out the fastest practice time again in the final third session. In qualifying, she set a new record. By all accounts she was so driven that all she could think about was the course record. There was a smoldering fire in her eyes that hadn’t been there in 1984, and her drive was infectious to the team.If the Americans had known that little French lady better, they would know that the only things she does is trying to be perfect !
Race day is victory day
On July 13, race day, the image played out dramatically for the cameras. You see the Audi slowly make its way up the hill. Mouton sat inside, helmet on, as seven Audi Sport teammates pushed the car. Mouton steered the car while revving the engine in order to keep the highly-strung turbocharged 5-cylinder at temperature.
Then the starting flag finally dropped; a fiercely determined Mouton was off. Michèle attacked the first corners flat-out and harder than ever before. By just the fifth corner, it was quickly apparent that track conditions were different than they had been in qualifying. Rain had fallen the night before and conditions were slippery. In those days, the course was entirely dirt and gravel all the way to the summit, requiring constant drifting around treacherous corners. Finding less grip here than before, Mouton adapted and fell into rhythm. She later described it as a dance from left to right…even when the road got more slippery requiring her to drift less and focus more on staying as straight as conditions would permit.
Near the top was the biggest challenge. She’d identified three fast corners near the end. In practice, Michèle pushed her limits and learned that she could take two of the three flat-out, but she’d continued to lift however slightly for the second turn during every previous run. Hell-bent thanks to critics, she now decided to stay flat-out. This time her Sport quattro slid further, precipitously closer to the edge of the narrow course. Glancing to her right, the gaping drop was vividly clear. As the Sport quattro streaked past the flag waiver at the summit, the official clock logged a time of 11:25.39, shattering Al Unser Jr.’s standing 1983 record by 13 seconds. At the top of the mountain, her response was measured. She raised a fist toward the sky in accomplishment when her time came across the loudspeaker, but other than a few hugs, that was it. Michèle was still analyzing, still calculating. She’d beaten the nearest competitor by 30 seconds. She theorized she would have been 10 seconds faster had she experienced the conditions encountered during qualifying.
When she did pilot the Sport quattro back down to the Audi Sport encampment in the paddock, the celebrations were decidedly less restrained. This time, they’d won the mountain outright. Michèle was Queen of the Mountain and the Sport quattro was the first car with fenders, blister-flared as they were, to win over an open-wheeled car in a very long time.
Michèle Mouton is still the only woman ever to have won the Pikes Peak International Hillclimb.
Publication: 26/06/2023Back to overview
