In 2018 I had the chance to step back in time—almost a full century back—when I visited one of motorsport’s most unusual relics: the circuit of Sitges Terramar. Nestled in the hills near the Mediterranean coast, just a short drive from Barcelona, it’s a place that feels both forgotten and monumental.
Walking into Terramar, you quickly realize this is no ordinary track. Built in 1923, it was one of the world’s earliest permanent racing circuits, opening only two years after Brooklands in England and Indianapolis in the United States had already shown the world what banked oval racing could look like. Terramar, however, was extreme. Its concrete banking tilts at up to 60 degrees, so steep you can’t walk up it without scrambling on all fours. Even today, nearly a hundred years later, the sheer scale of those curves is breathtaking.
A Short, Intense History
The Sitges Terramar circuit was the dream of Frick Armangue, a Spanish racing enthusiast who wanted to put Catalonia on the motorsport map. The track was built in record time and hosted its first international race in October 1923. But while the engineering was impressive, the finances were not. Payments to contractors fell through, legal disputes arose, and the dream quickly soured.
Despite that rocky start, the track wasn’t abandoned right away. Through the 1920s and 1930s, local events and speed trials took place, but Sitges Terramar never achieved the status of Montjuïc or later circuits in Spain. By the time Formula 1 started to rise after the Second World War, Terramar had already slipped into obscurity.
Over the decades, the track became part of a working farm. Sheep grazed in the infield, farm buildings appeared, and weeds pushed through the cracks in the concrete banking. Unlike other lost circuits that crumbled away, Terramar simply faded into the landscape, quietly enduring the passing years.
My visit in 2018
When I visited, it felt almost surreal. You enter what seems like farmland, and then suddenly you’re standing at the edge of a massive bowl of concrete. The silence was striking—no grandstands, no engines, no cheering crowds—just wind and the occasional bird.
Climbing partway up the banking, I tried to imagine what it must have been like for drivers in the 1920s, wrestling primitive machines around a track that looked more like a wall than a curve. The engineering bravery—and the courage of the drivers—was palpable even in its emptiness.
What impressed me most was how intact the place still is. Yes, nature has softened the edges, but the circuit remains remarkably complete. The outline is still there, the surface still recognizable. It’s one of those places where time hasn’t erased history, just paused it.
The Echo of Engines
Sitges Terramar is more than a lost circuit; it’s a reminder of the boldness of motorsport’s early years. Builders and drivers were experimenting, pushing boundaries, and taking risks without knowing if the idea would even work. Today, the circuit stands as a concrete fossil—silent, weathered, but unmistakably proud.
For me, walking the banking in 2018 was like touching history with my own hands. It’s a place where motorsport’s past lingers just below the surface, waiting for anyone curious enough to step off the beaten path and discover it.
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