I realize I said "Buckle Up", however of course, seatbelts were not a thing in 1937... So try to hold on!

"Back then, Germany seemed an entire world away from England." B-17s: "It's not that far."

“And was killed shortly thereafter. Never ever really raced again.” Well I’d hope not.

Silver arrows in the front and then the rest of the finishers behind them. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Funny thing is the Auto Union was a fusion of 4 different brands, thats why they have the 4 rings. If you now look closly on the left side of the steering wheel, there is a small patch that says Horch on it. Horch was the brand that mostly developed the Auto Union Gran Prix Cars. Horch in German can be a slang in some regions for the phrase "höre hin" what basically means "listen to it or hear it". The latin word for hearing is AUDI so yeah i think thats some great background info....

The sound of the car is just amazing. Just imagine having >500hp in those days on these tires! Those drivers were just so dedicated to what they were doing! I think when Rosemeyer was killed on the Autobahn doing the record attempts they reached over 440km/h in those cars, beautifully streamlined for the attempts. Rosemeyer stated, that at those speeds he could only hold the steering wheel between his fingertips, because a minimal movement actually put him on the on the other side of the road!

Hey. This is a really great video and captures the vibe I was trying to create when I built this track... I have Since acquired some more great research about the back straight (which right now is a little too wide) so I'm defo gonna update this track in the new year

Actually, in 1936-37, Alfa Romeo scored several victories over the Auto Union Type C and Mercedes-Benz W25K. In fact, in 1936, the Alfa Romeo 8C-35 and 12C-36 (both built on the Tipo C platform) may well have been a better car than that late variant of the W25. In 1938, Rene Dreyfus driving a Delahaye 145 V12 beat the Mercedes team with the W154 at the Pau Grand Prix, really pissing off Hitler in the process (a French car, and a driver with Jewish heritage, beating his precious German entry). In 1938-39, the Alfa Romeo 312 and 316, as well as the Maserati 8CTF, were fast, but tended to hit reliability issues. Now, the Maserati did manage to win the 1939 and '40 Indianapolis 500 races with Wilbur Shaw at the wheel. On the flip side, a catastrophic day for Mercedes, a lackluster showing for Stuck, and whatever other factors, led to Talbot scoring a podium in the 1939 French GP at Reims. Of course, I wish there were proper 1936-37 and 1938-39 car sets for any of the sims. One car in particular though that I wish there was a mod for is the actual Alfa Romeo 12C-37, which was late in the game and suffered teething problems, only appearing at the 1937 Coppa Acerbo (Pescara) and Italian GP (Livorno), but if there was one non-German car that was closest to matching the Germans in performance potential, that would probably be it. The 12C-37 had a new chassis and bodywork, which were carried over for the Tipo 312 and 316, and the V12 was enlarged from the 1936 car (up to 4.5 liters from 4.1), giving 430 hp, a notable increase from the 360-370 of the 12C-36. And yeah, if the German streamliners could be included in a car set. And in the wake of the 1938 Pau GP, namely the issues with the Alfa Romeo 308, Tazio Nuvolari cut himself loose from Alfa Corse and subsequently joined Auto Union. As for other tracks to try these cars on, Deutschlandring is probably about the best period option. I know there's a slightly crude version for rFactor, but I don't know that any of the newer sims have a mod for the 1926-51 version of Reims. Naturally, the Nordschleife is always a possibility, and there's a good Nurburgring '67 mod that's more faithful to the narrowness, lumps/bumps/jumps, and meanders that the circuit used to have. In addition, I should think that Fonteny, Feldbergring, and Battenbergring (when it comes out), would work pretty well with these cars also. Honestly, while the mod is done very well, and the track is period, Donington is a bit tight for the big German and Italian cars of the 1930s. Maybe include French in there too if you're talking about the Bugatti Type 54 or Type 59/50(B). If the track (Roosevelt Field) were available for AC, I'd suggest looking at the Vanderbilt Cup races from 1936 and '37, in which the Europeans had a heavy presence. Nuvolari won in 1936 with the Alfa Romeo 12C-36, while Rosemeyer won in '37 with the Auto Union Type C. And back to Donington to finish, as Nuvolari won that race in '38 with the Auto Union Type D.

The music, the car sounds, just the whole vibe is on point. Absolutely brilliant

As someone who has a real affinity for auto racing from the first half of the 20th century - thank you! This was amazing. The bit about the shoe being set on fire I’m pretty sure was Herman Lang and if memory serves me right, it was more of a case where the heat transfer from the engine caused the sole of his shoe to melt to the pedal, but he refused to stop and wound up with second and third degree burns (he was a very flinty character who really had to fight for every single thing within the team; giving up was not in his DNA.) Now for a little bit of superfluous pedantry (sorry!) - bernd rosemeyer’s last name is (more or less) best pronounced ‘roe-say-meyer’ (just slur the first two syllables together a little) or think of how us ‘Muricans say ‘Rosé’ (the pinkish wine variety.) you nailed von Brauchitsch, though, and I’d say that one is much harder to get right (and I totally excuse not even mentioning Rudolf Caracciola - that’s a bit tricky even in german.) Lastly, for anyone who wants to read up on this era of racing, Alfred Neubauer’s biography is a pretty fantastic source - if you can find it, that is. His style is more of a raconteur recalling his life and so has an almost novel-like quality to it. Whereas the German version (‘Männer, Frauen und Motoren’ - literally, ‘men, women and engines’) is still in print/readily available (I read it as such when I was a teen), the English version (‘speed was my life’) has been out of print since the initial publication in the late ‘50s (I keep looking for a decent reading copy that doesn’t cost ~$150.) Anyway, maybe you should try tackling pre-world war I Grand Prix racing next...;)

i would love to host a fictional 1930s European oval championship with the tracks that existed at the time 1. Brooklands (Great Britain) 2. Linas-Montlhery (France) 3. Sitges-Terramar (Spain) 4. AVUS (Germany) 5. Monza (Italy) Would be so much fun!!

Love this track, 10 miles away from my house! Donington used to have a great museum collection of Grand Prix cars from throughout the history of Formula 1, sadly it was closed a couple years back :(

Honestly when the Auto Unions and Mercedes cars started showing up at GPs it was a bit like taking an F1 car to an F2 race today. Everything else was so much slower compared to them. I can't even begin to imagine how it would be to race something with this much power, yet with brakes and chassis that, while advanced for the time, where nowhere near enough for cars of such raw speed.

So glad I'm here for your channel's renaissance.

When I was a kid my dad had a slot car set and it came with a huge picture on the box of one of those Mercedes coming off the ground at the Nurmbergring.

Years ago i say a lot of your races of GPL , i am happy to see that you are back now, and great race!

I can't wait for the GPL 1937 mod. I got the attention back on SRMZ

Dude I recommend a book called The Grand Prix Saboteurs by Joe Saward. About grand prix drivers who became British secret agents during the war. Interesting read!

Oooh Donny 1937, not too far from my gaff in South Yorkshire. 😁 Nice one GPLaps!!

Amazing stuff, crazy to think these cars were basically carts with airplane engines and bicycle tyres. An incredible story from those times is the one of the 1935 German Grand Prix: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1935_German_Grand_Prix Tazio Nuvolari won with an old Alfa Romeo Tipo B against far more performant German cars at the Nuerburgring... it was a time when drivers could sometimes make a crazy difference in those machines.

I am a enthusiastic collector of Donington 1937/38and am very impressed with this post. If you want to learn more about Donington, an excellent book is PIONEERS by John Bailey. Would highly recommend it. The real race was crazy in that the Silver arrows were hitting 200 mph down the back straight and actually lapped the ENTIRE field 7 times. Really excellent races. Keep up the great work on these videos.

Love the pre-war stuff! My god, these cars look like they're really hard to drive. Can't imagine how much guts you need to race them in real life

Probably like seeing Hannibal's elephants for the first time by those that only heard stories. Intimidating and jaw-dropping.

Not only, but especially the engine sound is so atmospherical! It's almost like being set back to this ara by real! Awesome, GPLaps!

the only damn racing channel I can watch, this is still the best one going. Brilliant

Your commentary is so good in all your videos. You also have such a good knowledge of all the races you do, naming drivers as you pass them, naming corners, explaining how the car is behaving... its really entertaining! Let's be clear about something, watching people drive in a sim is 99% boring, you just watching some dude do laps... but your videos are next level. I could watch you lap random cars around random circuits for hours. Basically, well done on a quality channel, and thank you!

If you're interested in the story of those cars and Auto Union as a whole, I really recommend the August Horch Museum in Zwickau, if you ever find yourself in eastern Germany. It tells the story of the Horch cars, Horch leaving and founding Audi, forming Auto Union (and the Piech family working there before moving to Porsche), the racing, Audi taking over the Auto Union logo after the war and the rest of Auto Union being deleted due to the Soviet occupation and producing the Trabant (lots of those on display as well). Also lots of other cars from DKW and Wanderer which formed the other two rings of Auto Union. Highlight are the replicas of a Typ C and Typ D race car. There's just so much weird and interesting history behind the whole Auto Union thing.

I love how you give credit to the content makers, doesn't happen enough.

Just discovered your channel! Love it, can’t wait to see your growth

Man I LOVE this!! Thank you GPLaps!

Your enthusiasm and knowledge of motor racing is amazing... Love it.

Another master piece ! Outstanding video and driving.

Man, I just LOVE your content! I am a vintage racing fan (in fact, I am fairly vintage myself!) and you provide not only high quality videos, but really engaging commentary. Thank you!

Amazing this is like the third time I've watched this, Thank You Senpei!

You are an asset to the racing sim world. Keep it up!

A rather fitting choice of music lol most excellent! As well as the track!

This channel deserves way more eyes. I've learned a lot from watching your assorted videos The narration is top notch, the editing and production values are sublime. Congratulations!

I was lucky enough to be able to skip across the pond to attend the 2004 MotoGP British GP at Donington. This was fun seeing the old circuit layout and the difference in scenery. The old archway you drive through is still there but it just runs along close to the circuit now after you go through the Old Hairpin. Super enjoyable watch!

Love the new intro and channel art!

Some of the best content on youtube. Thank you very much

Amazing recreation of the track and can still see the similarities to todays track, like old hairpin to starkies bridge and the Dunlop straight to the Melbourne loop. Great content as always bud 👍🏁🏁

One of my favorite things to do in Assetto Corsa. Good video. Thanks!

Recently came back to Sim racing, i like your content, keep it up!

Amazing track, definitely my next download.

Jake its always a pleasure. Pristine content. 🍾

i like the cars and the entire atmosphere of that era.

watched another video of yours the other racing the pre- wars cars at fonteny, and liked your idea of doing pre war at donington, so i ended up racing 1930 benz SSk's there, and it was a great time.

doing 10 laps of the nurburgring in these things in forza was hell. and forzas not close to a sim. cant imagine what its like in AC.

So little of that is recognisable as Donington. Fantastic video and effort.

u deserve more than 10k subs, love ur vids

Really cool. nice video!

Thank you, thank you, thank you for taking me back to the thirty's... Wonderful cars and also scarey cars. You may take me too more of the same race's every time...🤗🍀

Wow what a race! Love these cars and love this track!! I think I can see Prince Bira's ERA type B at the back of the grid, amazing!!

That Auto Union type C was special. It had a V16 engine with roller bearings everywhere. The crank shaft was bolted together in order to install all of those bearings.

Trees, walls, houses, bridges...plenty of ways to come to a sudden stop. Ouch! What an experience, love your channel with it's historical perspective.

Another great history lesson and very impressive driving, I could not do the Auto Union 2 laps in a row without crashing. Well done Sir!

Congrats on this - I love AC and also the Vintage cars - ( much of whom need to be tuned before use )

I have been round this track a few times. (The modern version obviously lol) It is just down the road from my home, 20 minute drive at most. You can, as I am sure you know, still see a little of that bridge and the layout is still recognisable enough that you can place yourself very quickly. Awesome to see what it looked like. This is a very believable version of the track. I think they have gotten as close as is humanly possible without a time machine. Well done getting that thing round the track at all :D Awsome car I have a model of it.

This is my bucket list "go back in time" event! I am fascinated by this era ! Ive been to Donington many times for sports cars and F1 Grand Prix which Senna won,and many other races!! Thanks for this. P.s The hair pin corner and the old track leading down the hill and back up is still there now, they have a sunday market on it.

Outstanding video!

Interesting to see the current sections of the track; Hollywood, down the Craners, under Starkeys Bridge and back round through the houses at current Coppice Corner and down the straight past the exhibition centre. With the new main Donington pedestrian entrance at Hollywood you can now see the original extended Melbourne hairpin section on the left as you drive round to the car park/ entrance.

You GOTTA love the PC modding scene! A wonderful piece of early / 1990s internet culture that has amazingly managed to survive into modern times (with its extremely powerful and all pervasive online profit-motive) by sheer hobbyist passion alone! Just for the LOVE of it! Bravo all you fabtastico game modders! 💖 💖 💖

The house is actually a farm and the track goes through the farm yard, hence the building on both sides of the track. The germans thought it very uncivilised!

Great video, thank you !

Simply stunning looking, the sound is amazing, just beautiful to watch 👍😊😍

I love learning GP history from this channel, as I love racing but I don't know as much about the historical details (I'm an aviation history guy, usually)

Loving your videos mate! IMO the best sim racing content on KZfaq. Would you mind uploading the skins you've created for the Auto Union and Mercedes for us?

this track is so much fun,i use it all the time.

7:50 Well, Gand Prix of Germany 1935: Winner Tazio Nuvolari with Alfa Romeo, Hitler was not amused and they didnt even had the music for the italian anthem....But yes, it was just an episode.

How do you not have more subs/views? Gonna need to give my people access to this content

IT's too bad that no other racing sim has a replay engine as good as the original GPL replay engine. The data you could extract and use from those replays was amazing. Thanks for sharing this cool version of A.C.

awesome viddy sir

The A-U Type C was actually difficult to handle compared to the rather conservative Mercedes W125. The suspension, tires and chassis could not deal with the awkward weight distribution, and drivers had much less experience driving mid-engined cars. The oversteer was snappy, extremely hard to control. It took Rosemeyer, a *flat track motorcycle* rider, to perfect the car. Another thing, the Type C had about 100hp less peak power than the W125, but it was not slower in the straight line. Thanks to the mid-rear layout, Type C had much better traction and less drag. Also had a wider power band, and a 5-speed gearbox (only 4-speed in W125). These two very different cars had an interesting balance, which made for great races in 1937. I really hope the streamliners are modded into a simulator at some point, they are my favourite racing vehicles of all time. I've only seen a very unrealistic representation in Gran Turismo. Imagine the slipstream battles on Avus, I would totally buy a sim rig and install a simulator after 5 years of not playing if the streamliners came out in good quality.

I gotta try this. Looks amazing!

Really cool video. Like ;)

what an exhilarating vid guy

Thanks, really cool

Oh nice! You managed to replace the driver models in the Auto Union and W125!

I love these classic race cars, when drivers actually had to drive the car, no traction control or abs on these beasts. GPLaps, you should put where to get these mods, thanks and keep doing these videos

Beautiful

please keep going. I went to see rock bands at Donnington!

You need to do the 1935 German Grand Prix on the Nürburgring. Race alongside Tazio Nuvolari against the best the Germans could offer.

V16 - excellent choice!

4:24 Richard Seaman? Dick Seaman? Those old school racers were a different breed.

Great stuff. Imagine driving one of those things round the old Nurburgring... Care to give it a go? ;)

Amazing cars and track

So cool👍✨ loved it✨

I absolutely LOVE this track, added it to my classic F1 custom championship on AC

Bro the car in front of you wheelspins like there's no tomorrow 😂

Love your videos. Is it worth playing any of these sims without a wheel? I would get one if I find I liked them but I want to start out with a gamepad to see if I am interested in playing and find them fun.

I used to race this track with the RedBull X2010. That was an... an exoteric experience, to say the least lol

Where can I find the video you talk about in the beginning where someone gives the history of the race?

Great video! I am trying to recreate this race myself in AC, but only have 1 skin for the Auto Union - #5, Rosemeyer. I have been scouring the internet for the rest - where did you find them?? Thanks!

Wonder if anyone will ever make/ has made a Circuito Montenero mod, would love to see that track. Not the longest ever Italian track, Pescara was longer but the layout wasn't as interesting. Montenero is what i consider the Italian Nordschleife with the layout used from 1922-35. Looking at the road map of the layout it looks like it'd be a blast to drive.

FYI the house was probably there before it was a circuit; due to it having been an airfield before that; the circuit came later. And those cars from what footage I've ever seen didn't take modern racing lines; even in the later races post war they seem to slide more like rally cars just not quite so pronounced.

It's almost as if safety was absolutely of no concern back then. The tracks seemed like death traps.

Fun stuff indeed, its a cool track, what's the pit board indicator you use , thanks for your work.

4:23. You didn't wanna say "Dick Seaman", did you?

This has me curious, do any sims have any of the old high banked wood tracks? That would pretty neat for these old cars.

What mod is it to get the chalk board come up when you go past the pit wall?