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"Something bad happened in the 1980s. Very bad. As the decade of cocaine, Crockett &amp;amp;amp; Tubbs, and David Lynch movies came to a close, a new, safer, less hedonistic time followed. Old World ways fell when communism crumbled, and despite the advances that followed, some of the grit that made life interesting was lost. Racetracks were far from immune to these societal changes. Le Mans, once a fearsome circuit that many Grand Prix drivers simply refused to drive after surviving their respective eras in Formula One, sprouted a pair of chicanes that turned the Mulsanne Straight into a fiddly highway where 250 mph top speeds were neutered, chopped to 200 mph or so when the loathsome curves were installed in 1990. It was a sign of what would follow, as most circuits hosting FIA-sanctioned events became overrun by chicanes, diluting their character to the point of indifference. Long, uninterrupted straights that led into fast corners or threshold braking zones were soon in short supply.  For some of the old guard, nostalgia for the original, unadulterated tracks followed. No one cared for the danger and safety concerns that many of those tracks posed, but with so much emphasis placed on modifying track layouts rather than the simply improving the runoff areas and trackside barriers, a lot of soul was forfeited in the name of safety. With the construction of new tracks coming to a crawl by the eighties\u2014most of the popular series competed on decades-old circuits\u2014the popularity of temporary street races exploded. Street races had been around for some time, but with the costs involved to expand Formula 1, Indy or sports car racing into new markets, the option of erecting a temporary street course in a major metro area or new country was easier and more economical than building a permanent facility. By the late eighties, street races accounted for up to a third of the calendar for some championships.  Prior to the chicane craze, permanent road courses were designed with the driver in mind. Layouts were created to fit within the confines of the available real estate and to pose a challenging and enjoyable racing experience. If that sounds simple and plain, it is. It wasn&amp;#039;t long before FIA guidelines followed that made track design a paint-by-the-numbers affair. A straight can only be X long without being terminated by a turn or chicane, etc., and formulaic tracks like Japan&amp;#039;s Autopolis represented all that was wrong with the concept. In America, NASCAR&amp;#039;s boom manifested in countless 1.5-mile cookie cutter ovals that blanketed the south and Midwest like Kudzu. And even some of our cherished road courses succumbed to the age of boredom. Austria&amp;#039;s Hans Stuck, the racing legend whose high-handed driving was said to &amp;quot;kill more bugs with the side of the car than the windshield,&amp;quot; openly professed his love for northern California&amp;#039;s Sears Point Raceway. The original configuration, which hosted everything from Indy cars to Trans-Am to NASCAR, maintained its Nixon-era safety measures well into the 1990s. It could be lethal; even pit lane was dangerous, and the sprawling 2.5-mile circuit went under the knife.  But after the treacherous track conceded to modern standards, there was something different about the winding Wine Country layout. It knocked down a few hills, added a few corners to give NASCAR a configuration that lent itself to stock cars, added another section farther down the track that motorcycle racers asked for, but it left the layout that Stuck loved alone. It&amp;#039;s safer and has more runoffs (in most areas), but the track where he thrilled fans back in 1989 in his Audi 90 IMSA GTO car is still there, waiting for his return. The IndyCar series races at Sonoma once a year and opts for a version of the motorcycle configuration instead of the classic &amp;quot;balls of fury&amp;quot; layout, but the old girl still demands respect. Old track, modern upgrades, and all without selling its soul. I love it.  Since the FIA placed its chokehold on circuits in the nineties, there&amp;#039;s been a refreshing bit of levity and creativity allowed\u2014especially in F1. Sure, Hermann Tilke has been allowed to design plenty of forgettable tracks since then, but we&amp;#039;ve also seen some non-conformist layouts get the green light from the FIA, with Circuit of The Americas topping the list. It&amp;#039;s unlikely we&amp;#039;ll see another Nordschleife get built, but its 14-mile expanse continues to serve as the measuring stick for badass tracks. Compare that to a track like Topeka in Kansas, a painfully safe and utterly forgettable circuit that sits forgotten in the Heartland, and the extremes of racetrack evolution are evident. If we&amp;#039;re lucky, future circuits will fall somewhere in the center, while still giving a nod towards the beacon cast by the &amp;#039;Ring. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a4466/the-road-ahead-evolution-of-race-tracks/>