Chris Rae - The Nürburgring

Breidscheid Revisited

Pages bolted together by Chris Rae

Opened in 1927 after two years' development as part of a work-creation programme, the north loop (Nordschleife) of the Nürburgring provides 20.8km (13 miles) of incredible driving and breathtaking scenery through the Eifel mountains in Northwest Germany. After nearly half a century of Grand Prix, it was closed in 1976 after Nikki Lauda crashed badly on a sweeping bend just before Bergwerk. Motorsport's loss, however, became the public's gain. The circuit was opened as a one-way Autobahn toll road and the hoi polloi were let loose.

To drive on the Nordschleife, you need to have a road-legal car and a lap ticket. You can buy these (well, not the car) at the circuit; if you are thinking of doing a large number of laps then it's well worth buying a season-ticket. There is a 95db noise limit (lower than most UK circuits) and the marshals at the circuit do test cars at the starting gate.

As with most webpages, this one is under development, but so far you can see:

My first trip (March 2000) - passenger extraordinaire
My second trip (May 2000) - Diesel hire car
My third trip (March 2001) - snow go
My fourth trip (April 2001) - blew up my car, wrote off flatmate's
My fifth trip (May 2002) - Hire car again, scant trip report
My sixth trip (May 2003) - RX7; good clean fun
My seventh trip (September 2004) - Impreza; busy little gaggle of us
My eighth trip (October 2004) - Polo hire car. Was ostensibly part of a Romantic Weekend Away so only two laps in. Polo was fun; not too much traffic. Overtook a Porsche (erm, 944)
My ninth trip (May 2005) - Not too much exciting again
My tenth trip (May 2005 again) - spectating at the 24h
My eleventh trip (September 2005) - Impreza; my brother's first time on a bike
A Name That Bend quiz I wrote once (it's an Excel spreadsheet)
My Nürburgring links
My twelfth trip (August 2006) - my own stag do. Wrote this up on my travel blog, which might or might not still exist
My thirteenth trip (September 2006) - my honeymoon. Just one lap in our caravan tow car - also written up on my travel blog

If you have any comments or suggestions about these pages, please e-mail me. If you're really bored you could check out my homepage.