Ancillary F1 - Tilke Engineering
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- File: ancillary3.mp3
- Transcript: ancillary3.pdf
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This is Sidepodcast’s mini series – Ancillary F1. We’re talking about the companies that are around the grid, supporting the teams, but not getting much of the glory. We’ve looked at Bridgestone, and McLaren Electronic Systems, and today it’s the turn of Tilke Engineering.
Hermann Tilke trained as an architect and engineer, but was a racer before he decided to start designing tracks. He competed in touring cars, and endurance racing, mostly on the Nurburgring circuit. As the resident expert on that particular course, after he set up Tilke Engineering in 1984, the organisers turned to him to provide a new access road at the circuit.
The first big racing track job Tilke Engineering undertook was in the mid-90s, and the task was to shorten the Austrian Osterreichring into the safer A1-Ring. The changes were clearly a success in the eyes of Bernie Ecclestone, as the design of the brand new Malaysia circuit in 1999 was entrusted to Tilke Engineering. Since then, every new Formula 1 track has been designed by the company and many more historical layouts have been touched by the hand of Tilke.
Revisions made to existing circuits include lengthening Fuji, neutering Hockenheim, and fiddling with his old favourite, the Nurburgring.
Hermann Tilke himself doesn’t just design the track and hand it over to the company’s 130 architects and engineers. He gets involved at every opportunity, from initially selecting the area, to deciding what buildings will be nearby, and of course, designing the entire infrastructure that will have to cope with a Grand Prix weekend. When that special moment comes, the first race at a new circuit, Tilke likes to be there, along with those colleagues that were involved. He says that they know the track inside out, whereas the locals may still need a bit of guidance.
Despite being Ecclestone’s go-to guy for track designs, Tilke Engineering has come under fire for producing boring races. Bahrain and Valencia are the first tracks that spring to mind, both benefiting from the traditional Tilke style of long straights and sharp corners, but with very little to distinguish them. Turkey could be considered a successful circuit design, but even that has just the one Turn 8 super-corner and the rest pales into obscurity. Despite this, Tilke himself says that he tries to add flavours of the local culture, for example in China, some of the grandstands have roofs that commemorate the traditional Chinese lotus leaf.
Regardless, the future of Formula 1 looks to be Tilke shaped, with Abu Dhabi, Cape Town, and Korea all signed up to receive the Hermann hand of engineering. The plans for a revamped Donington Park also bear a familiar insignia .
Many fans are saddened by the lack of circuits that are formed through more natural processes than a man and his Bulldozer. Silverstone came to being on an old airfield and features some of the more memorable corners on the calendar. With so many new Tilkedromes signed up for future calendars, it seems inevitable that we will lose some of the original, and some might say best, racetracks. Ecclestone clearly isn’t a sentimental person.
That’s it for this edition of Ancillary F1. Don’t forget to leave your thoughts on Sidepodcast.com, whether about this series or about Tilke and his designs. I’ll be back tomorrow with another Ancillary company.
Theme music: Porter Block, Second Wind.
October 4th, 2008 at 10:44 pmr.g (my fuji, its mini me) said:
only need to mention the word of Tilke and people immeditly shudder. awful tracks, awful. really hope whoever replaces bernie realises this and stops hiring him. his work is awful.
just awful
October 5th, 2008 at 1:04 amJordan Allen said:
Warning:
Today I feel extremly evil. Not just picking on Button or Franck evil but boot the devil out of hell because he has not paid the rent evil.
I am thinking that all of F1’s problems can be solved by having Tilke completly redo Spa in his image. I guess that would not have to including straightening Eau, Rouge, but filling in the valley to make it billard-table level.
And then Kemmel needs to be connected to Blanchimont. We need to keep the Bus Stop, not only will that slow down the cars more but without the Bus Stop, Spa will not have the needed number of corners to be cousidered an F1 track….
Can not be too safe in F1 nowdays….
Where’s his address so that I can propose these changes for a piece of the action….
October 5th, 2008 at 2:25 amJeremy said:
Info on the Singapore GP track, taken from http://www.thetradingplaces.com/lifestyle.php
A number of initial track concepts were created in association with the Singapore Tourism Board (STB). The detailed architecture and engineering is being handled by Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR), a Melbourne-based architectural practice. They have lengthy experience of street circuit design going back to the creation of the Adelaide Grand Prix circuit which hosted the Australian GP…
October 5th, 2008 at 2:51 pmStuart C said:
I think Tilke is unfairly derided, actually. Unfashionable view, I know, but he does the best job he can with the real estate available to him.
The problem really is that the cars and drivers are too good.
October 5th, 2008 at 3:11 pmChristine said:
My only problem is the monopoly. I can’t believe he’s the only person in the world who can design an F1 track.
October 5th, 2008 at 3:29 pmJourneyer said:
Makes me wonder what would’ve been if John Hugenholtz, the man behind such wonders as Zandvoort, Suzuka, and the original iteration of the new Spa, was still with us.
As it is, we’ve got to make do with what we have. I guess Mr. E’s timelines are just too tight nowadays for him to look for new circuit designers other than Tilke. Let’s remember that for Bernie, he’d have to build relationships with these new guys, and even then, he’d be taking a risk that these newcomers can create new circuit designs with quality within a short period of time.
October 5th, 2008 at 5:12 pmSteven Roy said:
Tilke raced on the Nurburgring? Were his eyes shut?
To be fair Stuart we did have a discussion here not so long ago where we said that Turkey is the only track he has designed that was not on entirely flat ground.
There is apparently somewhere a second FIA approved track designer but it seems like their only function is to provide a ‘competitive’ tender to compare Tilke with.
Why can’t someone get som Hugenholz DNA and inject it into Tilke.
October 6th, 2008 at 2:34 amJordan Allen said:
I am quite sure I could design you an F1 track but in the wonderful tradition of Canadian F1 circuits (Mosport Park, Mont Tremblant and now Gilles Villeneuve is starting to get a little too tough now), it would be deemed too dangerous for the F1 drivers to drive on….
Of course, I am inspired by the old “Hella Licht” blind right-hander that was just behind the crest of the old Osterreichring… Now, that’s a real corner.
October 7th, 2008 at 2:28 pmAlianora La Canta said:
In theory, anyone can design an F1 circuit. In practise it’s extremely complicated. Track design is in itself a narrow field. F1 is very much an old boy’s club at the upper levels, making it difficult for a newcomer to make an impression. Also, the regulations for F1 are very strict, so the FIA would be worried about the possibility of another designer straying from the regulations even if it didn’t actually happen.
Also, it’s worth noting that there are a lot of circuits already, so the sub-F1 market is pretty well catered for in many countries (at least with regard to single-seaters). This limits opportunities for upcoming circuit designers to practise and tends to favour well-established designers.
Still, it would be nice if other designers’ tracks made it onto the calender. It would not only add variety to the calender, but it would make all the tracks look better (I’m sure part of the reason Tilke’s tracks look bad is due to there being so many of them - too much of the same thing?)
It would also be good if fewer processions occurred on his tracks, but that’s more complicated than just “fix the tracks”. Others things also have to change, like the homogenity of basic car design must be broken.