Nivelles Baulers, the Circuit That Played Safe

Designed near Brussels as a safer answer to Spa, Nivelles Baulers staged two Belgian Grands Prix, both won by Emerson Fittipaldi, and is now an industrial estate.

Nivelles Baulers was built to solve a problem, and solved it so thoroughly that it created another. The circuit opened in 1971 at Nivelles, Nijvel in Dutch, within easy reach of Brussels. Roger Caignie and John Hugenholtz designed it as a safer answer to Spa, in an era when the Belgian Grand Prix was supposed to alternate between Wallonia and Flanders. The 3.724 km lap was flat and wrapped in vast run off areas. Many drivers called it bland and sterile, and spectators found the action kept at a very polite distance.

Two races, one winner: Nivelles was nothing if not consistent. Its championship rounds were the Belgian Grands Prix of 1972 and 1974, and Emerson Fittipaldi took both. He won the first from pole for Lotus. Two years later, in a McLaren, he started fourth and held off Niki Lauda by 0.35 seconds.

The money ran out early. The organizer went bankrupt in 1974, although sponsors stepped in to save that year's race. When Nivelles's turn came round again in 1976, the irony was hard to miss: a circuit built for safety was turned away because its worn surface was judged unfit for Formula 1. Cars had stopped racing there by around 1980, motorcycles carried on until 1981, and the circuit closed for good when its license lapsed that June. The deserted pits and track lingered for years until demolition early this century cleared the ground for an industrial estate, where fragments of the old circuit can still be traced.

Every Grand Prix here

• 1974 Belgian Grand Prix
• 1972 Belgian Grand Prix