Lime Rock Park
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
|
|---|---|
| Track layout | |
| Location | Lakeville, Connecticut, USA |
| Time zone | UTC-5 (UTC-4 DST) |
| Owner | Skip Barber |
| Operator | Skip Barber |
| Broke ground | 1955 |
| Opened | 1957 |
| Major events | American Le Mans Series Grand-Am Rolex DP & GT NASCAR Camping World East Series Vintage Festival |
| road course | |
| Surface | asphalt |
| Circuit length | 1.53 mi (2.46 km) |
| Turns | 7 |
Lime Rock Park is a natural-terrain motorsport road racing venue located in Lime Rock, Connecticut, United States, a hamlet in the village of Lakeville, Connecticut, in the state’s northwest corner. The track is owned by Skip Barber, a former race car driver who started the Skip Barber Racing School in 1975. The track is touted as the ‘‘Road Racing Center of the East,’’ and each year hosts everything from ALMS and Grand-Am prototypes to NASCAR development series and SCCA regional and national events. The annual Lime Rock Park Vintage Festival is approaching its 30th year in 2012, while the track’s car shows draw from across the U.S.
Dozens of local, national, amateur and professional organizations and sanctioning bodies, such as the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA), National Association for Stock Car Automobile Racing (NASCAR), BMW Car Club of America, Porsche Club of America, the Skip Barber Race Series, Eastern Motor Racing Association (EMRA), Vintage Sports Car Club of America (VSCCA), Grand American Road Racing Association (Grand-Am) and American Le Mans Series (ALMS) hold professional races, high-speed touring, weekend amateur racing and driver training school events at Lime Rock Park.
Lime Rock is unique among U.S. professional racetracks in that it has no grandstand or bleacher seating. Hillsides around the inside and outside of the track provide ample spectator areas and good sightlines of the track, contributing to the picnic atmosphere and park-like setting. The track does not charge for parking, and it continues a long tradition of not charging admission for children 12 and under. In 2009 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Contents |
[edit] Track
The track is 1.53 miles (2.4623 km) long and consists of 7 turns, while the optional course is slightly shorter at 1.51 miles (2.4301 km) with 10 turns.
[edit] Track improvements
A major reconstruction was undertaken in 2008, separate from the safety improvements in 2004 (false grid and pit lane expansion) and 2006 (three-rail Armco, additional run-off area in the Uphill, full paving of A Paddock). Immediately following the traditional Memorial Day race weekend and just before the July arrival of the American Le Mans Series (ALMS), in the first week of June, 2008, the whole circuit was dug up and replaced in its entirety with a new aggregate base and complete asphalt paving. Most of the apex- and track-out curbing was also replaced, while the “Morton Chicane” in the Uphill, built in 1989, was removed.
In addition, two new corner-complexes were built, in order to provide options at the Uphill (turn 5) and West Bend (turn 6). Barber’s intent was four-fold: create new threshold-braking zones to encourage passing; allow the track to be configured in four different ways; decrease the average mph for the fastest cars (ALMS and Daytona Prototypes), especially the mid-corner speed through the Downhill; and provide the Skip Barber Racing School with additional corners and braking/downshifting areas.
(Option at the Uphill... The original Uphill remains, but sanctioning bodies, the racing school and car clubs can choose to use the new section: At the end of No-Name Straight, there is a threshold braking zone for a first-gear righthander, followed by a relatively open left-right uphill complex that then straightens and joins, in about the same place as did the now-absent Morton Chicane, the original chute between the Uphill and West Bend.)
(Option at West Bend... Close to where the turn-in point is for original West Bend, the circuit continues straight, followed by an inconsequential right, then a low speed right-left complex that puts the cars back on the original track about 150 feet before the beginning of the Downhill.)
[edit] Track layout
The track is considered short for an American road course, though it’s longer than England’s Brands Hatch Indy (1.198 miles). Lime Rock Park is fast and flowing, with only one braking zone that approaches threshold braking (into Turn 1, called Big Bend). Rhythm, momentum and track knowledge are the keys to fast lap times here. The track has two significant elevation changes: the Uphill corner rises three stories within its 415-foot (126 m) length, while the Downhill drops 65 feet (20 m) within its 515-foot (157 m) length. The front straight is nearly half a mile long (with a long, paved run-off area at the end).
The corners are better known by their names than numbers. Leaving the Downhill, you’re on the 2,400-foot (730 m) front straight. Big Bend (turns 1 and 2) is a long (approximately 725 feet), slightly more than 180-degree right-hand turn with a decreasing radius in its second part. A short chute (400 ft) leads to the Lefthander (turn 3, about 555 feet), so named because it’s the only left on the circuit. Next is a 200-foot (61 m) chute leading to the Righthander (turn 4, about 200 feet (61 m) long). This left-right complex is known as the Esses.
Exiting the Righthander puts you on the 1,200-foot (370 m) No-Name Straight; it’s got no name because it’s not actually a straight! But it acts like a straightaway because drivers do not need to lift for the right-left squiggle at its beginning. (These "squiggles" appear as "zig" and "zag" on early track maps).
Next up is the Uphill, an intimidating corner for the uninitiated. It doesn’t have a huge amount of run-off (even after the 2006 and 2008 reconstructions) and, since it rises three stories, you can’t see the exit. After the relatively sharp crest (even “slow” cars get light at the top, which drivers must anticipate with their hand position as the car is still experiencing cornering forces), there is a 700-foot (210 m) straight that leads to West Bend (turn 6, about 190 feet (58 m) long), a fast right-hand sweep. Exiting West Bend, you’re on a 575-foot (175 m) chute. Just after passing under the Bailey Bridge (see note below), you head down six stories for turn 7, the Downhill, a very fast, slightly-more-than-90-degree right where, for instance, an ALMS prototype is getting to the apex at about 140 mph (230 km/h). At the exit, you’re back on the front straight heading for Big Bend.
Footnote: The auto bridge over the track to access the infield is a World War II-surplus Bailey Bridge, believed to be the only surviving example still in daily use. As part of the 2008 track reconstruction, the bridge was raised 8 feet (2.4 m) when the new abutments were built.
[edit] History
The track was built in 1956-1957 on the grounds of a gravel pit and farmland owned by local farmer Frank Vaill. His son, Jim, had some friends who on Sundays would bring their MG-TC to the pit and “roar around” the dusty grounds. In 1954, some people from the SCCA (Sports Car Club of America) showed up to see ‘‘the track’’ they had heard about. That’s when Jim Vaill, with support from his father, decided to actually build one.
According to Rich Taylor’s book ‘‘Lime Rock Park: 35 Years of Racing,’’ published in 1992, it was in early summer of 1955 that ‘‘Vaill got an old aerial photo of his dad’s property and using white paint, drew a race track on the photo. ‘You could tell just by looking at the photo where the track would have to go,’ Vaill said. ‘You could see where the sinkholes were, where you could and couldn’t run the track. It was dictated by the terrain.’ Vaill jumped on his Caterpillar D-8 bulldozer and started cutting a swath...’’
The first event at Lime Rock Park was an SCCA driving school, when 152 cars showed up on Saturday, April 20, 1957. The first races were a week later; Sunday, April 28, when 6,600 race fans came through the gates – including newsman Walter Cronkite, fashion designer John Weitz and New York restaurateur Vince Sardi – to watch eight sports car races sanctioned by the SCCA's New England Region. The first race was won by Ted Sprigg in an Alfa Giulietta. The day’s fastest lap (1:10.4) was set by Walt Hansgen in a D-Jaguar owned by Briggs Cunningham.
Many racing historians consider the September 7, 1958, event as the very first all-professional road race in America, when George Constantine drove an Aston Martin DBR-2 to the win at Lime Rock Park, beating Bruce Kessler’s Ferrari.
By 1959, John ‘‘Skip’’ Barber, in his first year of racing, had raced his Austin Healey Sprite at Lime Rock. It was also the year that a small group of locals prevailed, after two years of effort, in having a court issue an injunction – in place to this day – disallowing racing on Sunday at Lime Rock Park.
Also that year was an event at Lime Rock that shook up the racing world. On July 25, 1959, the track hosted what came to be seen by racing historians as ‘‘the best race ever held by anybody, anywhere.’’ Sanctioned by USAC (United States Auto Club) and sponsored by the New York Mirror, the concept was, as author Rich Taylor put it, ‘‘Revolutionary: Run whatcha brung. For money.’’
It was called International Formula Libre, a once-in-a-lifetime event where every kind of race car imaginable was entered. A 300 cubic inch Corvette Stingray. A 2.0-liter Cooper Monaco. A Maserati 250F (a model that competed in 46 Formula 1 races between 1954 and 1960, winning eight time). Porsches, Jags, Aston Martins – even a Chevy-Ferrari ‘‘hybrid.’’ Drivers included a woman (Denise McCluggage), Lance Reventlow (the Woolworth’s scion), Tony Bettenhausen, Pedro Rodriguez – even NASCAR driver Jocko Maggiacomo. Also in the race, driving the aforementioned Cooper, was John Fitch, a Lime Rock director for a decade and the track's first general manager.
Formula Libre was a spectacular three-heat event that, when it was over, had an upset-winner of major magnitude: Indy 500 star Rodger Ward, driving Ken Brenn's 1.7-liter Offy-powered Kurtis USAC midget. In mixing road racers and oval track stars, Lime Rock’s Formula Libre show was, as Taylor puts it, ‘‘decades ahead of its time.’’ A crowd of nearly 12,000 people had shown up for the history making event...
Through the 1960s and 70s, Lime Rock was the nexus of North American road racing, due in significant part not only to its challenging layout but its proximity to New York City and Boston and those cities’ wealth, power and media clout.
In 1984, Skip Barber (who in 1975 had started his eponymously named racing school, now the world’s largest) got together with a group of investors and purchased Lime Rock Park from then-owner Harry Theodoracopulos. By the early 2000s, Barber had become the sole owner.
In the 50+ years of Lime Rock Park, nearly every racing series, nearly every kind of race car, and nearly every racing driver of note has competed at the track, from Can-Am, Trans-Am, USAC, NASCAR, VSCCA and endless other sanctioning bodies; from Lolas, Lotus, McLarens, Penskes, Ferraris, Porsches and countless other marques; and from Andretti, Gurney, Jones, Hobbs and Holbert to Moss, Newman, Tullius, Posey – truly, hundreds of racing’s past, present and future stars.
[edit] Today
On April 10, 2008 Skip Barber held a "groundbreaking" ceremony for the upcoming reconstruction. At the same time, he announced the creation of the “Lime Rock Drivers Club,” a members-only organization with benefits analogous to an exclusive, private country club – but with racing and driving being the draw, not golf. Members are guaranteed a considerable block of private track days and instruction, in addition to Club amenities. The Lime Rock Drivers Club not only raised needed capital but ensured the track’s long-term existence by giving club members an equity interest in the facility.
The biggest spectator weekends are the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series during the Memorial Day weekend; the July American Le Mans Series (ALMS) races; the NASCAR Camping World Series East event; and the long-running Labor Day Vintage Festival.
The facility is booked in one form or another – from racing schools, driving schools and corporate events to private manufacturer test days, ‘‘open’’ test days and, of course, the spectator weekends – close to 220 days per year, April to November. Lime Rock’s infield has one of North America’s longest natural autocross tracks (a paved layout that’s not simply a course defined by cones on a sea of asphalt), complete with elevation changes.
The track’s biggest user, aside from the professional spectator race weekends, is the Skip Barber Racing School, the Skip Barber Driving School and the Skip Barber Race Series.
[edit] External links
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Lime Rock Park |
- Lime Rock Park website
- Skip Barber Racing School (Uses Macromedia Flash)
- January-March 2006 Construction photos
- Trackpedia guide to driving Lime Rock
Coordinates: 41°55′40″N 73°23′01″W / 41.927688°N 73.383599°W
|
||||||||
|
|||||||||||
|
||||||||||
