Abandoned Race Track: Augusta International. The fastest road course in the U.S.?

[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so I know I can't be the only one that treats the rest topics it's like pit al at least to the speed limit now and fifty-five miles an hour welcome back to lab for the world I'm Richard and today we are on interstate 40 headed down towards Augusta Georgia by way of North and South Carolina to a racetrack that I'm betting you've never heard of and yes I see you over there furiously trying to google it but don't worry it's not just you that's never heard of it in fact anybody who's been looking for an active Road course in Augusta Georgia hasn't been able to find one for the past 48 years that's because augusten International Raceway closed in 1970 and that's unfortunate because I think a gust International Raceway its location notwithstanding could have become one of the crown jewels for road racing in the southeastern United States we're talking about a track here that in its day was longer than Road Atlanta had more turns than Atlanta Motorsports Park and a greater overall elevation change than either of those tracks this does beg a question though I have been why am i driving the five hours from Knoxville to Augusta Georgia if there's not actually a racetrack there the city of Augusta has actually built a public park where the infield at the Three Mile Road course used to be in doing so though they haven't actually demolished all of the track surface in fact the vast majority of the track is still there that's the part that's kind of cool I'm hoping to be able to actually like walk around the old surface and see what a lap of the track would have actually been like I'm pretty excited but for now I'm gonna get back to driving because I've got about four hours left and I'll pick you guys up once we get to the park if you're wondering how to find Auguste an International Raceway you just need to look up Diamond Lakes Regional Park a library along with campgrounds and courts and fields for various sports now occupy what was the infield of August internationals Three Mile Road course arriving mid-afternoon I started my tour with a stop at the Rex white Motorsports Memorial Plaza here stands a monument to the old track and the drivers who raced on it as well as a set of commemorative benches that also serve as seating for an outdoor learning area the memorial and learning area were made possible by the Augusta International Raceway Preservation Society a 501c3 nonprofit in conjunction with 5w kids Georgia Racing Hall of Fame Augusta in Richmond Parks and Rec and the August a Public Library System if you'd like to learn more about the Preservation Society or support them I've left a link in the description below more than one of the members helped me with research for this video so check them out moving on though to get from the monument to the old track surface you just have to take a walk into the woods behind the library building and then on to the old pit lane 50 years ago this pit wall would have separated up to 28,000 fans from the support teams within just some knee level piping and serving as a guardrail between the crew area and the hot pit lane so here we are in the pits as it happens of old Augusta International Raceway and what I'm gonna try and do is walk a lap of the old circuit and kind of take some video and pictures along the way with the aim of trying to piece together a lap to give you guys an idea of what it might have been like to drive around this track back in the day now if you can't tell already by the state of my shirt and the sweat on my brow this is an act I may regret given that it's 90 degrees here and I'm carrying a knot in substantial amount of camera gear with me but that's okay sacrifices must be made as we make our way around the course me on foot you by way of video and photos I'll keep track of where we are on an outline that I'll put in the lower left corner as we head towards Pitt out you can see the irregular often grass filled trenches left from the deliberate scarring done to the track soon after it was closed to prevent people from using it illicitly [Music] so coming straight out of the pits this track does not screw around I don't know if you can see that behind me or see the degree to which this just drops into a bowl I can only imagine coming out of the pits you'd probably have to stay along the top of the bowl there before you drop down onto the racing line or join the racing line on the exit but will respect the blend line and keep on going here the turn one complex is an impressive one the banking is significant in the approach up a hill and over a crest after the frontstretch would no doubt have meant a very fast entry as you can see the banking on that turn actually gets steeper as I went past the trees where I could see it earlier such that it really gets into quite a bowl here I actually had to balance my slider on my camera bag to get it to level so it's probably a good you know this is probably 10 plus degrees of banking at this point as we exit turn one and start a long run downhill it's worth noting that just north of here underneath a housing development sits the foundations of a planned two-mile tri-oval and just a severe would have been the planned infield golf course of Augusta International indeed the original proposal included eight different Motorsports been used including a hydroplane boat course in the infield Lakes the plan for Augusta was indeed ambitious unfortunately this was no Field of Dreams and although they built it no one came for the 1964 Augusta 510 the NASCAR organizers predicted a turnout of 75,000 only 15,000 people actually came to watch okay so we've just finished what would have been a long downhill run from turn one way up there and we're coming into what's going to be a left right sweeper complex that's gonna set up the technical section of the course with another series of turns after that the actual turn count for August International seems to vary by source from as few as 12 to as many as 21 turns I'll admit I was skeptical about the higher number until I walked the track at which point I can definitely see a case for a number of less pronounced changes of direction that would increase the tally so I'm just now walking out of what I can only assume would have been absurdly fast downhill s's so we've come back to the right here and this is where the old circuit is going to join a public road again briefly before dipping off back into the woods all right you should be able to see behind me up the hill where we've come from out of those fast asses the track has taken a turn back to the left and it's going to disappear into the woods again just pass the like stop sign caution sign thing back there so here we go all right well we are now back off the beaten path and things have levelled out a little bit I think we're still trending downhill at this point but it's nowhere near as steep as it was a moment ago I'll just give you a quick pause there that's where we came from and that's where we're going okay so we just come out of another search with a long left-hander we're getting ready to switch back into another what looks like another sweeping right-hander here on the backside of the course at this point I'm gonna have to pick the pace up a little bit I think if you can't if you can't tell I'm losing sunlight as I continued walking approaching the bottom of the hill 120 feet below the highest point at the pit exit it was interesting to consider the famous names that had driven this now goes to the track Jim Hall Bob Hobart Ken miles Bob Bondurant fireball Roberts even a Richard Petty turned laps here at one point or another where I was now hiking all that is to say in spite of current appearance is this was no backwoods track when it was conceived I'm now standing on the lowest point on Augusta International Raceway dubbed Gator Hollow by one racer in the 60s I believe this is where the creek that runs across the area from the springfed lakes in the infield passes outside of the racetrack at this point it also leads into one of the more picturesque sections of any racetrack I've visited had I not been parched hungry and a bit moist at this point I'd have been really tempted to set up a chair and just enjoy the scene before me Augusta International apparently wasn't always this pastoral at the height of its use the site and grounds were still mostly bare sandy soil with maybe a scrubby pine tree here and there indeed when asked how the tract could be improved one racer simply quipped more grass I think he would probably be satisfied at this point you can't tell me that this would not have been a spectacular turn the lake on the inside big sweeper with banking at some point approaching the late stages in the lap it occurred to me that nearly every turn so far was significantly on camber probably in the double-digit degrees of banking it's almost as if Augusta International is some missing evolutionary link between road courses and high banked ovals some forgotten love child of Sebring in Daytona [Music] so right after you would have come out of the spectacular lakeside sweeper it's time to stand on the brakes and get ready for a 90-degree right in spite of this tracks location in Georgia we allegedly have some Tennessee whiskey to thank at least in part for the interesting track layout the story goes that Glen fireball Roberts a NASCAR hot shoe at the time hopped into a Jeep with the site developers they proceeded to open a bottle of Jack and just start driving around the approximate outskirts of the property taking turns knocking back shots and hammering in steaks it now suddenly makes sense why the straightest part of the track is just past turn one that segues into another hypothetical question that comes to my mind and that is whether this track could even have persisted into the modern era with its original layout intact only a few other racing venues have managed to do so the rest have seen modifications for safety first and foremost as well as changes to improve competition as cars have developed over time most significantly with aerodynamics since August internationals all-too-brief heyday well we're almost at the end of the lap these last few turns before the front stretch is where the track I think really starts to show its age then you see this tree behind me that's not a small tree and it's growing in the middle in the dead center of the racing surface so that guy's probably been growing there 40-plus years at this point crazy as we watch another panoramic shot from on high I'd like to take a moment and thank Michael from Sky G aerial imaging for the tiny puttin dodging weather and making multiple trips to the site to fly a lap at the track and get these shots so we're back we're about finished with a lap at this point we could take a right and head into the pits or we could continue down the main straight on the left entering from the Windsor spring road entrance onto Diamond Lake sway headed east you actually joined the old tracks front stretch right after the intersection with Dave McDonald Drive a street named for a former August 2 race winner and follow its path until the crosswalk between the ball fields in the dirt overflow parking area and so after crossing the start/finish line approximately here we would have been turned into a long uphill right-hander that would have eventually deposited us back at turn one and pit out thus completing our lap of Augusta International Raceway the fact that nearly every turn at Augusta has positive banking and essentially none of them are exceedingly tight leads me to suspect that this was a very fast track indeed unfortunately we don't really know what that means in modern terms because the fastest cars to have a run here were Prix can-am era of sports prototypes certainly a far cry from a modern prototype or gt3 car fortunately we have some data to draw from and can do a little racetrack algebra to help extrapolate a comparison first let's compare Augusta to another period-appropriate track that we know is fast now we can't use Road Atlanta because it didn't actually open until after Augustus shut down fortunately there's another option between 1964 and 1965 both Augusta International and Road America hosted rounds of the United States Road racing championship or us our RC Road America is notable here in that as I mentioned in that track feature its layout hasn't changed since 1950 so we can use it as something of a constant between 1964 and now for our comparison next we need a car and driver combination that ran both places at the same time or approximately the same time Jim Hall in his chaparral 2 a racer fit the bill in this case qualifying first and finishing second in the 1964 to race and winning the 1965 road America contest gems race average at Road America was recorded as 89 miles an hour in his chaparral his race average of Augusta in the same car over 97 miles an hour jumping forward 53 years and in 2017 a ganassi racing Ford GT averaged around 103 miles an hour winning its class at Road America if we do the quick proportion that yields a predicted 112 mile an hour race average for a modern gt3 car around Augusta International for comparison the same Ford GT averaged about 99 miles an hour at Road Atlanta and the winning gt3 pace of the ATAC 24 at the Nurburgring was just a little over 104 miles an hour for the first six hours of that race closer to home the 2014 Daytona 24 averaged 109 miles an hour for the winning Daytona Prototype car so yeah August was fast possibly the fastest track in North America and it's day based on this loose comparison okay I'll be completely honest that may have turned into a little bit more of a hike in a little bit hotter weather and somewhat more of an ordeal than I had planned on but it was totally worth it I can't believe this track this track is ridiculous every single turn I think had some kind of banking to it the friendly kind typically there is an awesome sweeper by the water the start/finish straight going into turn one was going to be a huge elevation change up and then a camber transition into that big bowl that we saw right out of the pit lane man it's a shame so I need to put this track in a video game as what needs to happen because I just wanna drive even virtually I think it would be worth it just to see what it would have been like back forty-eight years ago to have one last run around this track you know give me a dolor well now a DeLorean I don't want a DeLorean put a flux capacitor on the NSX and send me back I want to drive it what an awesome place highly recommended also this is a great nature walk as long as you're prepared for it not carrying about 30 pounds of camera gear and you remember to bring water and it changes shirts maybe a snack you get the point anyway I'm gonna go get dinner finally get a bunch of water change shirts and find my hotel and I'll see you guys in the next video if not at the track after returning from my weekend in Georgia I discovered during the course of my research that my wish for an electronic version of August international was already being granted by way of an assetto corsa mod that's a work in progress you'll find a card in the top right with a link to the video on that creators channel my understanding is that it's based on a mix of light our data and historic reference photos so it should be pretty faithful once it's fully decorated and available for download I suppose it's time to go dust off the old sim rig then [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: Lap of the World

Views: 178,587

Keywords: LapoftheWorld, Lap of the world, Abandoned, exploration, exploring, derelict, lost places, road course, Augusta, Georgia, remains, ruins, Racetrack, history, hiking, nature, cars, transportation, racing, motorsports, banking, vintage, historic, assetto corsa, racing sim, drone, drone footage, drone shot, lap of the world, nsx, acura nsx

Id: oD6grqgwfP0

Length: 22min 7sec (1327 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 28 2018