2011 German Grand Prix

Round 11 | Hockenheimring | 06/02/2012 - 12/02/2012

The Hockenheimring is an automobile racing track situated near the town of Hockenheim in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, located on Bertha Benz Memorial Route. Amongst other motor racing events, it holds the 2011 PGR Formula One German Grand Prix. Situated in the Rhine valley, the circuit is almost completely flat, with very little change in elevation.

In the early 2000s, the track was threatened to discontinue racing there, due to competition from other tracks such as the EuroSpeedway Lausitz and sites in Asia. The state government of Baden-Württemberg secured the financing for the redesign by Hermann Tilke in 2001.

The stadium section remained mostly intact, despite a new surface and a tighter Turn 1. However, the circuit was dramatically shortened, with the long, forest straights section chopped off in favour of more tight corners. In an extremely controversial move, the old forest section was torn up and replanted with trees, eliminating any chance of using the old course either for future racing events or for historic car events.

There was and still remains a great deal of criticism of the track redesign, in terms of ruining the previous unique technical challenges of the old Hockenheim circuit and delivering a new homogenised "assembly line" circuit without the character of the previous layout, whilst being beset by the perceived problems of other Tilke circuits.








Text: wikipedia,