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Report - - Rockingham Speedway, Corby June 2019 | Leisure Sites | 28DaysLater.co.uk

Report - Rockingham Speedway, Corby June 2019

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Underground_Jazz

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Hi All,

I've a bit of a thing for unused race tracks. Usually they're old RAF bases steeped with heritage coupled with motorsport. Not really in this case though... it was built on an old quarry.
Rockingham Speedway, whilst a fantastic venue, never really took off in the way they hoped, I don't think they ever filled every seat. That said, it was a firm favourite for the British Touring Car Championship and Formula 3 race series. Motorsport and such activity ceased in 2018 and it's now a vehicle storage site, soon to be development into a logistics hub. There are security patrols and cameras all over hence the view is mainly from the side lines. The grandstands are surprisingly high!

Here's what Wiki reckons;

"Rockingham Motor Speedway is a former racing motorsport venue in the United Kingdom, that hosted corporate driving days, driver training, conferencing and exhibitions, vehicle manufacturing events, track days, testing, driving experiences and motor racing. It claims to be Europe's fastest racing circuit, and was the first banked oval constructed in Britain since the closure of Brooklands in 1939. The venue hosted its last day of racing in November 2018 after being sold by its owners and will be redeveloped to become a logistics hub for the car industry.

Construction of Rockingham started late in 1999, with the opening meeting planned for May 2001. Rockingham Motor Speedway was constructed on a British Steel works brown field site as a banked oval with the intention of bringing the American oval racing across the Atlantic for the first time. The opportunity was taken to use the infield for further circuits. After almost ten years of planning and 23 months of construction work, Rockingham opened for business on Monday 15 January 2001. It was formally opened by the Queen on 26 May 2001. After the sale of the venue, Rockingham held a "super send off" to mark its final day as a racing circuit on 24 November 2018. Much of the site will become a logistics hub for automotive logistic companies"

Flickr Album - https://www.flickr.com/photos/137354851@N05/albums/72157714288680158


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Calamity Jane

i see beauty in the unloved, places & things
Regular User
Nice shots there. What a waste of resources all that building for 17 yrs worth of use!

Thanks for sharing, nice to see this
 

Speed

Got Epic?
Regular User
Good riddance. It deserved to fail really. Funny thinking we raced there in 2001 a week or two after it opened and everything was brand new pristine. Now it's a derp!
 

TW123

28DL Member
28DL Member
Used to love going here, all of the grandstands apart from the main one with offices were condemned only a few years after the track was built as they've all subsided so badly
 

honkie

28DL Member
28DL Member
Good riddance. It deserved to fail really. Funny thinking we raced there in 2001 a week or two after it opened and everything was brand new pristine. Now it's a derp!

I'm interested to know why it deserved to fail ?

I'm not one for going to watch motorsport so I never went but there was a lot of excitement when it was built .

Was it poorly managed ?
 

mockney reject

Moderator
Staff member
Moderator
Good riddance. It deserved to fail really. Funny thinking we raced there in 2001 a week or two after it opened and everything was brand new pristine. Now it's a derp!

I couldn't agree more, we had everything in plan with them to hold a vw show there, adverts done, tickets sold blah blah blah only to find they had lied to us about loads of stuff and they pulled out leaving us out of pocket.
 

Bikin Glynn

28DL Regular User
Regular User
I'm interested to know why it deserved to fail ?

I'm not one for going to watch motorsport so I never went but there was a lot of excitement when it was built .

Was it poorly managed ?

It was poorly designed & in the wrong place from the start (speaking as a Gretton boy)
& there is just not a following for "oval" racing here, there market research was poor & I think they just wanted something to fill the waste land & try to bring people into the town. hence why most of its use was for track days etc.
Dont think them enormous stands were ever more than half full!
 

Speed

Got Epic?
Regular User
Yeh, the whole idea was to bring american oval racing, nascar and the like, to the UK and make a big fat wedge! They totally ignored that fact no one wanted it here! After a couple of years the Americans gave up coming and it was just a white elephant. It was a track built to make money, not for people who may have wanted to use it, complete waste of everything.
 

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