Donington Park

Donington Park is a site near Castle Donington in North West Leicestershire, England, owned by Donington Ventures Leisure Ltd. It is used as a motor racing track, and is also the venue for The Download Festival. Donington Park has a contract to stage the Formula One British Grand Prix for a period of ten years from 2010.

The original Donington track was opened in 1931, and initially used for motorcycle races. In 1935 it saw Richard Shuttleworth win the Donington Grand Prix in an Alfa Romeo P3, in the 1937 Donington Grand Prix and 1938 Donington Grand Prix, the race winners were respectively Bernd Rosemeyer and Tazio Nuvolari, both in Auto Union ‘Silver Arrows’.
The Donington Circuit layout in 1937

The circuit at Donington Park was closed in 1939 due to World War II, when it became a military vehicle depot. In the early 1970s the circuit was bought by Tom Wheatcroft, who funded the rebuilding of the track, which was re-opened May 27, 1977. The first postwar race meeting was organised by the Nottingham Sports Car Club, but that nearly didn’t happen, as the local ramblers tried to assert their rights to retain access to footpaths at the eleventh hour. The meeting went ahead as a “Motor Trial”, a legal loophole that curtailed the use of single seater racing cars for that opening meeting.

The NSCC continued to run race meetings at Donington until the Donington Racing Club was formed and a licence to run race meetings obtained.

The Melbourne Loop was built in 1985 to increase the lap distance to 2.5 miles (4.02 km) and allow the track to host Grand Prix motorcycle races – at 1.957 miles (3.149 km) without the loop, the circuit was deemed too short. This shorter layout remains as the National circuit, which is used for most non-Grand Prix events.

In recent times Donington has held meetings of MotoGP, the British Touring Car Championship and British Superbikes, as well as the 1993 European Grand Prix.

Other events taking place at the track include the World Series by Renault and the Great and British Motorsport Festival. On 26 August 2007 the circuit hosted the British Motocross Grand Prix, with a purpose-built motocross circuit constructed on the infield of the road circuit.
World Series by Renault at Donington Park’s Melbourne Hairpin in 2005.

In 2007 the track was sold to Donington Ventures Leisure Ltd.

Donington Park is also home to a museum known as the Donington Grand Prix Exhibition which opened in 1973, and has the largest collection of Grand Prix cars in the world.

On 4 July 2008, Bernie Ecclestone announced that Donington Park will hold the British Grand Prix from 2010 onwards in a 10-year deal (having been hosted exclusively by Silverstone since 1987). The track will have a major upgrade, which was announced on 10 July 2008 to include an entirely new pit complex along Starkey’s Straight and increasing the circuit length to 3 miles, by the addition of a new infield loop, to get it up to the standards required for modern day Formula One racing. Experienced circuit architect Hermann Tilke will be involved in the work. The race will also be the first one to be accessed by public transportation only, as cars will not be allowed to enter the facility. The close by East Midlands Parkway station on the Midland Main Line from London to Sheffield is central to this idea. Planning permission for the development was granted in January 2008.

(source .. wikipedia) reproduced under GFDL

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