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Rockingham was doomed for many reasons, mainly because some bright spark decided not to take the advice of the people that run these tracks all the time, Americans, and made the banking too shallow! So for some parts of the track you couldn't run side by side, which made the racing dull for the faster oval formulae namely CART and ASCAR.
And they used the wrong cars for ASCAR, the ones they used were built mainly for short tracks, and the Rock is rather large! So from the start engines were blowing and the cars wer too easily written off.
Sadly the track never really caught on as a national venue, the F3 flying debacle never really helped neither did the pathetic attempts at safety for the BSB where numerous riders were injured due to makeshift surfaces and corners being setup and very poor safety measures in-front of the walls.
Fair play though, it is now running quite happily as a corporate venue, it's justa sahem that those magnificent facilities are not being used for something like F1, WEC, WSBK or stuff like drag racing or rallycross.
Is a shame, but I am struggling to know how a new venture like this could ever take off. The promises they must be making for jobs and infrastructure must be gigantic!
I do hope it works, considering the gigantic level of employment and the legacy of engineering this country has in motorsport, it's staggering that so few tracks have been approved in recent years! In fact we are struggling to keep a few of them open like Croft and Combe, and rarely due to reasons of economy, usually due to nimbies and a few idiots who ignore sound rules.
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