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Hermann Tilke
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hermann Tilke (born December 31, 1955 in Olpe) is a German architect, designer of Formula One motor racing circuits and auto racer.
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Since the 1980s, Tilke has been in touring cars, mainly on the old Nürburgring Nordschleife, in VLN endurance racing and 24 Hours Nürburgring. He and Dirk Adorf won in 2003 and 2004 some VLN races with a V8Star.
Tilke established Tilke Engineering in 1984 combining skills in architecture, civil engineering and electronic engineering to provide complete solutions for motor racing and waste disposal projects.
One of his first, minor tasks was a short access road at the Nürburgring, earned due to contacts made by his racing efforts there. He later redesigned the first turn of the circuit in 2002.
His first major job was the change from the fast Österreichring to the shorter A1-Ring in Austria, in the 1990s.
Having made numerous changes and safety improvements to the established stable of F1 circuits, Tilke secured the contracts to design many high-profile new world circuits from scratch. These include:
- 1998 Sepang International Circuit, Malaysia
- 2004 Bahrain International Circuit, Bahrain
- 2004 Shanghai International Circuit, China
- 2005 Istanbul Racing Circuit, Turkey
- 2005 Bucharest Ring, Romania
Tilke will design the Korean International Circuit, and it will hold a Formula One race in 2010
Tilke will design the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix track and it will hold the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in 2009.
Tilke was also involved in the radical overhauls of the Hockenheimring in Germany and most recently the Fuji International Speedway in Japan.
Tilke Engineering is also due to carry out work on Circuit de Catalunya, Autodromo Nazionale Monza, Nürburgring, Silverstone Circuit and La Ciudad del Motor de Aragon (Spain).
Tilke's trademark is a long straight followed by a very tight hairpin, which is supposed to encourage overtaking.
Many accuse him of designing boring circuits which are too similar to each other, and removing the character of the circuits he works on, especially the Hockenheimring in Germany by replacing the traditional long forest section by a long stadium left-handed turn and his boring trademark, a hairpin. Some insider also say that the Formula One sports has become his own playground as more and more of his designed circuits are added into the Formula One season, while those drivers are as poor little kids under his control.