Elkhart Lake Road Race Circuits

The quiet country roads around Elkhart Lake were once a racetrack. On a Sunday in July of nineteen fifty, thirty-three cars lined up on a three and a third mile circuit of public highways here, and well over five thousand spectators came to watch. The next year the course grew to more than six miles.

Allards, Ferraris, Jaguars, and the American-built Cunninghams roared through these curves, driven by legends like Briggs Cunningham, John Fitch, and the future Formula One world champion Phil Hill. But racing flat out on roads where families lived was dangerous, and after nineteen fifty-two Wisconsin outlawed it. Rather than let the sport die, a local highway engineer named Clif Tufte plotted a purpose-built four-mile track in the farm country south of the village.

He and a handful of neighbors incorporated Road America in nineteen fifty-four, and it has hosted racing ever since.