New circuit opens in Northern Spain

The 2.4-mile Navarra circuit

15,000 were on hand Saturday

The Circuito de Navarra opened its doors to spectators on Saturday 19th June before more than 15,000 visitors. The Circuito de Navarra is located two kilometers from the town of Los Arcos, on the road to Sesma.

It is the first and only circuit in the northwestern quarter of Spain, to balance the ones in Barcelona, Valencia, Jerez and Jarama – the regional Government has backed the €45 million investment in Circuito de Navarra.

The track will soon become an F1 Test grade track, a Grade 2 FIA race track and an FIM superbike and MotoGP test track; it’s already fully booked for national level races and the Superleague Formula cars right up to this year’s end; and it is set to be packed with car club track days, bike clubs from all over Europe (it’s just one hour from the French border) and manufacturer testing – Volkswagen have a major plant in the nearest city, Pamplona.

We are telling you all this because we here are all a bit confused about the Austin, Texas Grand Prix for F1 cars on a track that is not yet built…… Thought you’d like the comparison!.

Navarra took 3 years in planning and build, six months of inspection and licensing, big local investment, a whole long local public relations campaign – “why we are making this investment and what it will do for the local economy." And the Austin track is just getting started and they want to hold a race in 2012? Not likely.

Navarra is a wonderful technical race track, in a great location, between Rioja wine country and the Pyrenees mountains, easy air and sea ferry access from northern Europe and a good racing/summer holiday destination.