Braselton, Georgia · US
Home of Petit Le Mans. This 2.54-mile road course features dramatic elevation changes, including the famous Turn 12 downhill plunge and the challenging Esses.
Set in Braselton, Georgia, Road Atlanta is a permanent racing circuit. A lap covers 4.088 km (2.54 miles) and 12 corners, run clockwise.
It opened in 1970. WEC, GT and Road Course all race here. It holds roughly 150,000 spectators.
In 1969 David Sloyer, Earl Walker and Arthur Montgomery bought 750 acres of farmland in Hall County, Georgia, intending to build a road course to international standard. Excavating, grading and paving it took six months. The first race ran on 13 September 1970, a 300 km Can-Am event won by Tony Dean in a Porsche 908/02, with Stirling Moss as grand marshal.
The circuit drifted through the 1980s and was bought in 1996 by Don Panoz, whose sports cars were built nearby in Braselton. Panoz wanted an American equivalent of Le Mans and worked with the Automobile Club de l'Ouest to adapt its rules, launching Petit Le Mans in 1998. It became the centrepiece of North American sports car racing, and the circuit is still best known for the plunge downhill through the Esses and the blind, steeply cambered turn twelve.
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