Written by Brett Barnes
The eastern United States is spotted by historic road racing venues that are a must to visit. Watkins Glen, Limerock, Mid-Ohio, Nelson Ledges, and Summit Point are all great racing hot spots. Locations that when you visit you can just imagine your driver idols racing at in the past. Unfortunately for many fans they haven't made a trip to what is considered by many to be the ultimate natural road course in North America. Mosport International isn't in the eastern US but it is easily driven to from there. Yes you have to have a passport, or enhanced drivers license to cross the border, but it's worth the effort.
Mosport is located just outside Bowmanville, Ontario, an hour drive east of Toronto. The track is placed in the rolling hills of a sand and pine forest. It has hosted the Canadian Grand Prix Formula One, Can-Am, IMSA, and many other events over it's 48 years. It has eleven turns and extreme elevation changes, that challenge drivers to their limit. Mosport has some of the most intimidating high speed corners in racing, period. Turn two is slightly off camber downhill left turn. Downhill to the point of falling off the earth at full throttle in many cars. After the hard right of turn one the driver is under full throttle for the left that creates enough negative g's that it presses them up into their harness. Again at turn four you are falling off with no bearing as the ground disappears below you, just to be pressed into the seat as you climb into the double hairpin of Moss corner. The back straight, Andretti, isn't straight and uphill to boot. This place is just different enough to fall into it's own category of race experience.
What you rarely read about is the fan experience of this classic course. There was a posting on an industry forum a couple weeks before the ALMS event that said "if you can't relax at Mosport, relaxing is probably not in your vocabulary." That statement sums up the fan experience here. You can set up your tent or camper most anywhere on the track and meet some of the nicest people ever. Unlike many modern racing venues if you're not on the track or in the paddock you can probably camp there. You will find campers in the fields trackside or even in the pine forrest that dominates half of the infield. Night time brings surreal sights of camp fires as far as you can see. People laughing and enjoying themselves echo through the rolling hills. Depending on where you camp on this track may determine what time you will get to sleep. So before you set up camp next year ask around, or play it safe and go to family camping. Trust that family camping is not a bad place to be as it sits on the outside of the fastest part of the track. Camping at turn 4 is an endless party all weekend. Just don't plan on getting out of there before the end of the race as there will be no room to move with all the parked cars from the fans that are walking up to Moss.
The big weekend of the year for Mosport is the August American Le Mans Series event. This year we heard a lot about how few cars there were. Funny the same people say they would come here to watch if there were even fewer cars. That has a bunch to say about this wonderful place. So you missed it this year, but don't make that mistake again. Start planning to be there next year for the big American Le Mans weekend. If for some reason your idea of camping consists of room service and a key card, you are missing out. At least make some friends and hang around a campfire for a while before heading back to your hotel. You will not regret it.
