The 10 best hidden European racing circuits

Everyone knows the big-ticket racetracks in Europe. The lucky among you have probably had the opportunity to drive their hallowed bitumen. But what if you are wanting euro driving thrills without the well-worn wheel tracks? Step this way.

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10: Bilster Berg

• Length: 4.2km
• Nearest airport: Dortmund (122km)

Circuit designer Hermann Tilke doesn’t deserve his reputation as the guy who builds soulless F1 ‘Tilkedromes’.

Still, the F1 rule book must feel like a straitjacket, so the former Cold War ammunition depot of Bilster Berg Drive Resort is what happens when Tilke bins the rules.

Secreted far from spying eye in a pine forest near Bielefeld in northern Germany, your first glimpse of the track is a wall of bitumen: the Mausefalle (Mouse Trap) which careens down into a crushing compression before leaping up into a completely blind corner just as the car unweights atop the crest.

It’s almost malicious, but turns out to be an absolute riot to drive.

This mini-Nordschleife rewards agility: try a Lotus Exige.

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9: Franciacorta

1. Length: 2.5km
2. Nearest airport: Brescia (32km)

Think Italian motorsport and you’ll probably think of charismatic names like Monza, Imola, Mugello, Fiorano or Vallelunga.

Franciacorta probably hasn’t ever come across the radar. But it should, especially if you happen to be a Porsche owner.

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Carved into a quarry, Franciacorta opened fully in 2007, with Porsche buying the facility and opening its largest Porsche Experience Centre last September.

As well as the highly technical main circuit, there’s a separate low low-friction handling circuit made of polished concrete and an off-road facility.

A quick 30km Uber from Brescia airport will present you at Porsche’s door with an array of track-ready vehicles and packages to indulge in. Easy.

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8: Circuit de Lédenon

1. Length: 3.2km
2. Nearest airport:Nimes (25km)

Like a miniaturised Portimao, a lap of Lédenon will have your windscreen alternately filled with sky then tarmac as it rollercoasters wildly.

With more relief than any other French circuit and jaw-dropping views across the Camargue, Lédenon came into being when husband and wife team Jean-Claude and Sylvie Bondurand started bulldozing a circuit on their land back in 1971.

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It’s remained in the family ever since. Open for business 300 days of the year, it’s unsurprising that the track is in great nick.

However, every year sees a new noise challenge from local holiday home owners, so you may need to get here before it’s too late.

Something with torque works well here. A Viper holds the lap record.

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7: Contidrom

1. Length: 3.8km
2. Nearest airport: Hannover (35km)

Contidrom’s not really a race circuit at all. Instead it’s Continental’s test track near Hannover in northern Germany.

Unlike some test tracks that view the general public as a gross invasion of privacy, Contidrom periodically flings the gates open and hosts events.

The ‘main’ track is the 3.8km dry handling circuit, but the 1.8km wet course, with its permanent low-level sprinklers is more fun, especially in a well-balanced rear driver.

Opened in 1967, the Contidrom originally had two parallel straights before an ingenious engineer decided to link them with banked sections, the top of which is angled at 65 degrees. Driving this is an astonishing experience as you’re crushed into your seat.

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6: Circuito Guadix

1. Length: 3.0km
2. Nearest airport: Granada (83km)

Love drifting? Want to perfect your skills on a track with a very low likelihood of hitting anything solid if you have an indiscretion?

Circuito Mike G Guadix, to give it the full title, could be just the ticket. Located just west of Granada, it’s one of the few race tracks in Europe that looks onto snow-capped mountains in the depths of winter, with the Sierra Nevada draped with a blanket of snow between November and March.

Used chiefly as a test track, Guadix is so remote that it can be operated 24 hours per day even with vehicles that would snap the needles off most noise meters.

In 2008 the 19-corner track was resurfaced with a lower-deg tarmac. Guadix was also one of Michael Schumacher’s faves to ride on his Honda CBR.

If pushed to choose, we wouldn’t mind a rear-drive screamer like an E92 M3.

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5: Parcmotor Castelloli

1. Length: 4.14km
2. Nearest airport: Barcelona El Prat (60km)

Carved out of a Spanish hillside, this fiend of a circuit is tucked away in the Montserrat mountains of the Barcelona hinterland.

It was originally designed as a bike track, with input from the likes of Alex Criville, Carlos Checa and Toni Elias but it works equally well if you’ve got a car that’s light on its feet.

The 14-garage pit lane means it’ll never attract top-drawer race categories, but while friends and family are touring Las Ramblas down in the city, you have the opportunity to cut loose on a track with massive vertical relief and a figure-eight layout.

It’s only when you drop into a gorge and see the track teetering overhead on a giant viaduct that you realise how far you’ve plummeted.

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4: Circuit de Charade

1. Length: 3.98km
2. Nearest airport: Clermont-Ferrand (16km)

Clermont-Ferrand is the home of Michelin. Located in the volcanic Auvergne region of central France, Clermont-Ferrand is also the closest city to what has to be one of the most exciting, intimidating and intriguing circuits in Europe.

Completed in 1958, Circuit de Charade was originally an 8.05km track built around the two extinct lava domes that dominated the city. In 1965, it welcomed the French Grand Prix, and hosted the race in ’69, ’70 and ’72 before the modern Paul Ricard track was awarded the rights.

Incidentally, it was at Charade in the final 1972 race that the now-head of Red Bull Racing’s driver development program, Helmut Marko lost the use of his left eye when a stone from Emerson Fittipaldi’s Lotus punctured Marko’s visor.

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With no run-off at all on the mountain section, the track’s competitive days were numbered, and a horror smash in 1980 saw three marshals killed during a touring car race.

Events tapered down until the last local race was held in 1988. Since then, it’s been developed as a revised permanent facility using only the safer lower loop.

It remains hemmed in by concrete walls and it’s still unforgiving, but it’s scenic, charismatic and consequential. Plus, should you want to explore the original mountain sections of the circuit, they’re all still there as public roads.

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3: Gotland Ring

1. Length: 7.3km
2. Nearest airport: Visby (via Stockholm) (47km)

We’re guessing that you won’t just chance upon the island of Gotland, situated as it is in the middle of the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Latvia, but if you’re Scandinavia way, it’s well worth a detour.

During its development, much was made of the Gotland Ring’s ambitions to eventually offer a 28km circuit configuration, and claim the title of world’s longest purpose-built race track.

Anyone who’s ever become a bit disoriented at the back of The Bend’s full 7.7km length will be relieved to know that the 7.3km longest configuration of Gotland is more than ample.

The track divides into a technical northern loop and a faster, free-flowing southern circuit that can be linked.

With a focus on sustainability, the Gotland Ring is highly valued by manufacturers and race teams alike as a test facility due to its privacy.

Visitors with internal combustion guilt can take a Wind-Driven Ring Taxi lap in an EV.

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2: Circuito Monteblanco

1. Length: 4.43km
2. Nearest airport: Seville El Prat (69km)

Every once in a while you come across one of those motorsports white elephants that has clearly had a lot of money lavished on it for seemingly very little in the way of return.

Say hola to Circuito Monteblanco.

A short schlep westwards along the A49 from Seville is a circuit that has all the accreditation you could reasonably expect. It’s FIA homologated to T1 grade (F1 Testing) and FIA Grade 2 for races up to and including GP2, so you know that this is a serious facility.

The 4.43km GP length circuit features three separate pit lanes, a 960m front straight, 36,000 square metres of asphalt run-off and 50,000 square metres of gravel traps as well as sprinklers and low-mu epoxy surfaces for wet-weather testing.

With 26 different track layouts, you’ll never get bored and it only rains on 55 days per year here.

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1: Oulton Park

• Length: 3.64km
• Nearest airport: Manchester (40km)

We could probably fill this entire feature with British tracks, but if forced to choose one, it’d probably be Oulton.

If you only have time for one British track, make it Brands Hatch. If you also want to squeeze in another, it’s worth the schlep to Cheshire for this parkland circuit that flows beautifully yet throws in enough challenge to really keep you on top of your game.

Druids is one of the great corners anywhere; an off-camber, double-right-hander at the highest point of the circuit, usually taken in fourth gear. Be brave and you’ll make up heaps of time there. Get too greedy on entry and the previous left-hand kink will position your car too far to the right and you’re toast.

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At most big FIA-rated circuits, you’re a long way from anything and there’s little impression of speed. At Oulton, the full-tilt run down to Cascades feels berserk in anything with a bit of power, while Hislop’s chicane can get pretty tasty when two cars arrive side by side.

For Oulton, you’ll want something punchy, wieldy and adjustable. You wouldn’t go far wrong with a Mercedes-AMG A45 S. Watch the weather though. The northwest of England is notoriously damp.