The Nordschleife, today
the only circuit used, contains only 4 km of straight in its 22.18 km, and that straight
is interrupted by humpbacked bridges. Apart from the broad Startplatz between the
pits and the huge grandstand, is is of normal road width; cars blast down to the wide
sweep of the Sudkehre and back behind the pits to the slightly banked Tribunenkehre
or Nordkehre where they sweep left and vanish from the grandstand view.
Plunging downhill through the Hatzenbach
and Quiddelbacher Höhe in the forested Hocheichen valley, up past the Flugplatz
and the Schwedenkreuz, the road writhes its way down to the Fuchsröhre,
then up again to Adenauerforst. A series of fast curves then brings cars in a
downhill rush to Adenau Gate, then they climb past the cliff-like walls of Bergwerk,
plunge through a valley, then steeply uphill to the Karussel. This is the most
famous corner on the Ring, turning almost a full-circle, with a concrete-banked ditch on
the inside. (Carraciola's mechanic Wilhelm Sebastian is credited with discovering the
time-saving method of using the ditch as a banking in 1928-29.)
After the Karussel a long,
winding climb follows to the Höhe Acht, then dives down twisting and turning to Brünnchen,
through the fast Pfanzgarten bend and on to the Schwalbenschwanz double turn. Up,
then, to the Dottinger Höhe and a left-hand sweep onto the home straight with its
humpbacked bridges, a last 120 m.p.h. curve under the Autoniusbruche and so back
to the start and another tortuous 14.17-mile lap.
Today the longest circuit to host a Formula 1 race is the Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium that was shortened from it's original length of 14 kilometer to its current 7. The old town to town races of the heroic past of which the Mille Miglia, Targa Florio and the Carrera Panamericana were the remaining holdouts are a distant memory. Except for temporary street circuits in Monaco and now Singapore races are held on specially built and ever more antiseptic closed circuits.
Charles Jarrott, that wonderful chronicler and participant of motor racing at the beginning of the last century remarked that racing on closed circuits destroyed the charm and natural judgment required when racing on the open road and replaced it with the dreary monotony of grinding out a certain distance over the same road again and again, rewarding the drivers most reckless and daring rendered possible by the knowledge of the course. In fact he remarked how boring the last three-parts of the race had been on his way to victory at the 1902 Circuit des Ardennes and that he had not even bothered reconnoitering the circuit even though it was only fifty- three miles in length! To Charles Jarrott the continual passing and re-passing of the same landmarks were little more than tiring.
The current Formula 1 driver familiarizing himself with a new circuit in some oil-rich sheikdom can only dream of another Eau Rouge or 130R (Sazuka), such is his lot. The fan sitting in his $300 seat can hear but only see his heroes as they appear on the JumboTron.
Today there are many tomes on cornering technique available to the beginning driver, the most famous having been written in 1958 by Piero Taruffi. In his section on cornering he mentions the "conventional line" which in effect attempts to take a corner in more or less its maximum radius by starting at the outer edge of the road, clipping the apex and finishing again at the outside edge of the road. While Taruffi's book is considered by many including the great Fangio to be the first "text-book" on motor racing this technique has been around since the dawn of circuit racing. An eye witness at the 1908 French Grand Prix described the following, manner in which Leon Théry negotiated the difficult downhill bridge section at Ancourt.
"Hugging the outer edge of the road he cut across to the inside edge under the bridge and, cutting the corner on the other side in the same way, was gone up the slope without the trace of a skid."
Rain was called the great equalizer. To be considered good in the rain was a badge of honor to be called Der Regenmeister was the height of accolades. Gilles Villeneuve would credit racing snowmobiles;
"Every winter, you would reckon on three or four big spills - and I'm talking about being thrown on to the ice at 100 mph. Those things used to slide a lot, which taught me a great deal about control. And the visibility was terrible! Unless you were leading, you could see nothing, with all the snow blowing about. Good for the reactions - and it stopped me having any worries about racing in the rain."
Returning to the 1908 French Grand Prix and the bridge section at Ancourt. This section was considered very dangerous by the race organizer who placed a bugler at some distance who would announce the approach of a car with a blast of his instrument. This was to allow a flag man ample time to run up the road and warn any competitor should the section be blocked by an accident from another car. Luckily for the flag man this did not happen during the main event! Regretfully for the flag man the invention of onboard warning lights and safety cars were still almost a century away.
Charles Jarrott, that wonderful chronicler and participant of motor racing at the beginning of the last century remarked that racing on closed circuits destroyed the charm and natural judgment required when racing on the open road and replaced it with the dreary monotony of grinding out a certain distance over the same road again and again, rewarding the drivers most reckless and daring rendered possible by the knowledge of the course. In fact he remarked how boring the last three-parts of the race had been on his way to victory at the 1902 Circuit des Ardennes and that he had not even bothered reconnoitering the circuit even though it was only fifty- three miles in length! To Charles Jarrott the continual passing and re-passing of the same landmarks were little more than tiring.