Mosport Park

Mosport International Raceway

Mosport Park now known as Mosport International Raceway is a multi-track facility located north of Bowmanville, Ontario. Mosport, a contraction of Motor Sport and pronounced MoeSport features a 2.459 mile, 10-turn road course; a half-mile, paved oval; and the new 1.5-mile Mosport Driver Development Centre, which was developed from the karting circuit built in 1997.

The circuit, the first purpose built road race course in Canada, was designed and built in the in the late 1950s, and held its first major race in 1961, the Player's 200, a sports car race bringing drivers from the world over to rural Ontario. Stirling Moss won the event. The hairpin complex consisting of two corners is called Moss Corner in his honour as he suggested that it be that be two distinct corners to be of greater challenge to the drivers.

Many racing legends, like Stirling Moss, Gilles Villeneuve, Bruce McLaren and even stock car king Richard Petty, have raced at Mosport. No fewer than 16 Formula One World Driving Champions - men like Juan Manuel Fangio, Jim Clark, Jackie Stewart, Mario Andretti and Niki Lauda have raced here. Some ten Indianapolis 500 winners, including Rodger Ward, A.J. Foyt, Al Unser, Bobby Unser, Rick Mears and Gordon Johncock, have also raced at Mosport.

Sadly, Mosport has had several fatalities, both track crew, drivers and riders, the most recognized being German Manfred Winkelhock was killed in 1985 when his Porsche 962 crashed into a concrete wall. Details may be found at Motorsport Memorial [1].

Mosport has had a succession of owners since the original public company created to build the track. In 1998, Panoz Motorsports purchased Mosport. In 1999, the newly formed American Le Mans Series, formed by Don Panoz, visited Mosport for the first time. For 2001, the entire circuit was repaved to meet FIA specifications, and is now 42 feet wide. Drivers were consulted to ensure the character of the "old" track was kept; thus, almost all the "racing lines" have been maintained.

Ron Fellows who is from Mississauga, Ontario considers this is home track, and races both his Chevrolet Corvette#C6-R in the ALMS Series as well as the Cadillac CTS-V in the SCCA Speed World Cup GT Series at Mosport.

Today, there are many events on Mosport's calendar, the most popular of which are "lapping days", where amateur drivers in road cars drive quickly around the circuit in controlled conditions. There are nine Regional road racing events held there in a typical year, where Porsches, Corvettes, and very fast sport compact cars can be seen battling hard. The American Le Mans Series still visits annually, typically on the first weekend of September. CASCAR makes an annual stop as well in June.

Formula One history

Season	Date	Winning Driver	Winning Team	Report
1977	October 9	Jody Scheckter	Wolf-Ford	Report
1976	October 3	James Hunt	McLaren-Ford	Report
1974	September 22	Emerson Fittipaldi	McLaren-Ford	Report
1973	September 23	Peter Revson	McLaren-Ford	Report
1972	September 24	Jackie Stewart	Tyrrell-Ford	Report
1971	September 19	Jackie Stewart	Tyrrell-Ford	Report
1969	September 20	Jacky Ickx	Brabham-Ford	Report
1967	August 27	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Repco	Report

External links

• Official Site (partial source)
• Regional racing information
• Mosport Circuit (Spectator) guide at the Motorsport Wiki