Sitges-Tamarran Auto'drom Nacional...
I've been to some amazing places with some interesting cars and work over the last 7 years... but today was the "cake". I'm hard to shock but I'd never seen something so sad, yet beautiful, in the racing world before.
I heard of this abandoned race track just outside of Sitges Spain years before. Now I've found myself just north of Barcelona (an hour and a half away from Sitges) and I thought, it'll be a cool way to kill a few hours. The hair stood on the back of my neck when I saw this place... I don't have time to write a little history but I'll cut and paste something I found that describes the facility. I've attaced a few pictures as well. Entering the second turn, exiting the same turn and one that doesn't even start to show the enormous size of the track and it's steep walls, up to a true 90 degrees!.
__________________________________________________________
Senna on a hot lap. Fangio steering with the throttle.
Belief lowering the Nordschleife's lap record, froma standing start. An awakening Chevy stock-block.
These are the motor-racing things that take your breath awav. cause your heart to skip a beat.
In contrast, distant memories of disused tracks evoke a slippers-bv-the-fire glow. True, drive Dundrod, or Montjmch. or Chimay, or Solitude, and a sense of awe does rise from the pit ot vour stomach to lodge uncomfortably in the back of your throat. True. vour mouth dries as a consequence. But that's about all. Until now.
We roll to a halt alongside an impressive - in size and construction - retaining wall. Imagine a northern milltown cobbled street. Flip it onto its side, through 90 degrees. Flex it into a pleasing curve. That's about what we have here.
The farm track ahead disappears into a tunnel. No Pasar, Privada, the sign says. We mean no harm. We're just curious. We don't plan to blat round on a hired holiday scooter. We will be reverential. This, we know, is a special place. How special we're about to find out.
We scramble up the wall. taking care not to dislodge anything, and peer over its edge, like snipers. My jaw drops. Not metaphorically.
Literally. We have stumbled upon the Land that Lap times Forgot. A concrete crop circle. A white elephant's footprint Majestic. Mysterious.
The most impressive piece ofmotorsport architecture. Le Corbusier at 15Omph. A Falling Water for petrolheads. To our left stands an imposing 16th century fortified farmhouse. Its retro sits well with the track's nouveau. I stand to get a better view.
The stands, they could have been put up yesterday. Brooklands has suffered the caprices of British weather; Autodromo Nacional has been faithfully preserved by solid Spanish sunshine. The buildings are boarded up and a roof has been laid over the integral seats, but it's all here- bar the wooden trimming.
A lap is out of the question, home-made barricades of scrub, rubble and chain see to that, so we pull up on the curving start/finish straight - Sitges is kidney-shaped. Tufts of grass jut through the surface's 'zigzag' joins (to be explained later), but it is in remarkable condition otherwise, even on this section, where farm vehicles have done their worst Autodromo Nacional enjoys a 16-year technology advantage over Brooklands - 1923 compared to '07 - and its concrete is of a better consistency, is smoother,
and is beautifully edged, as a result. Deep pan rather than thin crust. This was meant to be the best, a showpiece.
Spain had big plans in the early 1920s. Part of the grandiose scheme was the construction of a modern road network. To this end, a Portland Cement factory was built close to Sitges. The track was their sampler, proof of the worth of their pre-cast sections, of the silence and comfort afforded by their aforesaid angled joints which precluded jarring caused by both wheels of an axle crossing them simultaneously.
This two-kilometre (1.242-mile) cutting-edge construction was gouged out of a rock face and moulded from 3.5 million kilograms of concrete in the space of 300 days during 1923. Two thrusting young architects, Jaume Mestres i Fossas (track) and Josep Maria Martino Arroyo (pits and grandstand), oversaw the project, and part of their brief was to build a Royal Box: King Alfonso XIII was coming to the races.
Autodromo Nacional was big news, a source of national pride for a country that had lagged behind industrial giants Britain and Germany and was determined to catch up. Sitges was meant to be a beginning. A pointer to a brighter future. It was to be a middle and an end, too. A microcosm, a litmus test of the problems and darker days to come.
I've been to some amazing places with some interesting cars and work over the last 7 years... but today was the "cake". I'm hard to shock but I'd never seen something so sad, yet beautiful, in the racing world before.
I heard of this abandoned race track just outside of Sitges Spain years before. Now I've found myself just north of Barcelona (an hour and a half away from Sitges) and I thought, it'll be a cool way to kill a few hours. The hair stood on the back of my neck when I saw this place... I don't have time to write a little history but I'll cut and paste something I found that describes the facility. I've attaced a few pictures as well. Entering the second turn, exiting the same turn and one that doesn't even start to show the enormous size of the track and it's steep walls, up to a true 90 degrees!.
__________________________________________________________
Senna on a hot lap. Fangio steering with the throttle.
Belief lowering the Nordschleife's lap record, froma standing start. An awakening Chevy stock-block.
These are the motor-racing things that take your breath awav. cause your heart to skip a beat.
In contrast, distant memories of disused tracks evoke a slippers-bv-the-fire glow. True, drive Dundrod, or Montjmch. or Chimay, or Solitude, and a sense of awe does rise from the pit ot vour stomach to lodge uncomfortably in the back of your throat. True. vour mouth dries as a consequence. But that's about all. Until now.
We roll to a halt alongside an impressive - in size and construction - retaining wall. Imagine a northern milltown cobbled street. Flip it onto its side, through 90 degrees. Flex it into a pleasing curve. That's about what we have here.
The farm track ahead disappears into a tunnel. No Pasar, Privada, the sign says. We mean no harm. We're just curious. We don't plan to blat round on a hired holiday scooter. We will be reverential. This, we know, is a special place. How special we're about to find out.
We scramble up the wall. taking care not to dislodge anything, and peer over its edge, like snipers. My jaw drops. Not metaphorically.
Literally. We have stumbled upon the Land that Lap times Forgot. A concrete crop circle. A white elephant's footprint Majestic. Mysterious.
The most impressive piece ofmotorsport architecture. Le Corbusier at 15Omph. A Falling Water for petrolheads. To our left stands an imposing 16th century fortified farmhouse. Its retro sits well with the track's nouveau. I stand to get a better view.
The stands, they could have been put up yesterday. Brooklands has suffered the caprices of British weather; Autodromo Nacional has been faithfully preserved by solid Spanish sunshine. The buildings are boarded up and a roof has been laid over the integral seats, but it's all here- bar the wooden trimming.
A lap is out of the question, home-made barricades of scrub, rubble and chain see to that, so we pull up on the curving start/finish straight - Sitges is kidney-shaped. Tufts of grass jut through the surface's 'zigzag' joins (to be explained later), but it is in remarkable condition otherwise, even on this section, where farm vehicles have done their worst Autodromo Nacional enjoys a 16-year technology advantage over Brooklands - 1923 compared to '07 - and its concrete is of a better consistency, is smoother,
and is beautifully edged, as a result. Deep pan rather than thin crust. This was meant to be the best, a showpiece.
Spain had big plans in the early 1920s. Part of the grandiose scheme was the construction of a modern road network. To this end, a Portland Cement factory was built close to Sitges. The track was their sampler, proof of the worth of their pre-cast sections, of the silence and comfort afforded by their aforesaid angled joints which precluded jarring caused by both wheels of an axle crossing them simultaneously.
This two-kilometre (1.242-mile) cutting-edge construction was gouged out of a rock face and moulded from 3.5 million kilograms of concrete in the space of 300 days during 1923. Two thrusting young architects, Jaume Mestres i Fossas (track) and Josep Maria Martino Arroyo (pits and grandstand), oversaw the project, and part of their brief was to build a Royal Box: King Alfonso XIII was coming to the races.
Autodromo Nacional was big news, a source of national pride for a country that had lagged behind industrial giants Britain and Germany and was determined to catch up. Sitges was meant to be a beginning. A pointer to a brighter future. It was to be a middle and an end, too. A microcosm, a litmus test of the problems and darker days to come.
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