Zandvoort's banking is 18 degrees. That is steeper than it sounds.

Why 2026 was the last Dutch Grand Prix

Zandvoort returned to the calendar in 2021 and left it after 2026. The circuit chose not to renew. So the banked corners described here are no longer part of a Formula 1 weekend, which makes the engineering behind them the durable part of the story rather than the race that used them.

The final running was round 12 of 23, held from 21 to 23 August 2026. It carried a Sprint for the first time at this circuit, which cuts practice from three sessions to one. That matters more at Zandvoort than at most places, and the reason is underfoot.

One snapshot for the record, not a running total. At the 2026 summer break Andrea Kimi Antonelli led the drivers' championship on 219 points, fifty clear of Lewis Hamilton, having won six of the first eleven races. Lando Norris took Hungary. Those figures describe August 2026 and are not maintained.

What 18 degrees actually looks like

Track banking gets quoted in degrees, which is a unit almost nobody has intuition for. Roads are quoted as percentages, and most of us have driven up something marked 12% and felt it.

So convert. A slope of 18 degrees is a gradient of 32.5%. Nineteen degrees is 34.4%. Mercedes puts the peak gradient at Turn 14 at 32%, which lines up.

Now the comparison worth having. Guinness World Records lists Baldwin Street in Dunedin as the steepest street in the world, verified on 7 November 2019 at 34.8%. That is a road people struggle to walk up.

Banking angles converted to road gradients. Bars scaled against a 36% axis. Indianapolis figure from Red Bull Racing, Baldwin Street from Guinness World Records. On the two Zandvoort corners the reporting is uneven, so it is worth stating where each figure comes from. The Race and Motorsport Week both give Hugenholtz 19 degrees and Arie Luyendyk 18, treating the corners separately, and Circuit Zandvoort's own corners page gives 18 degrees for Arie Luyendyk, which agrees. Mercedes-AMG F1 states 18 degrees for Hugenholtz. Formula 1's own site contradicts itself across its articles, publishing both 18 and 19 degrees for both corners. This page uses 19 and 18, the pairing the sources that report the corners separately agree on.

The Hugenholtzbocht is within half a percentage point of the steepest street anyone has ever certified. Drivers arrive there at speed and use the slope to fire themselves out towards the dunes.

Why does Circuit Zandvoort's own site say 32 degrees?

Because the units are transposed. Circuit Zandvoort's presentation page states that the Hugenholtzbocht has "a bevel of 18%, or 32 degrees", and says the same of Turn 14. Those two values describe different slopes.

Run it both ways. A gradient of 18% is an angle of 10.2 degrees. An angle of 32 degrees is a gradient of 62.5%.

The correct statement is 18 degrees, or 32 per cent, because tan(18°) = 0.3249. Red Bull's circuit guide pairs them that way round, 32% against 18 degrees, which confirms the direction of the error.

Source: Circuit Zandvoort's presentation page, the circuit's own site. Both conversions computed here as the tangent and its inverse.

Why the banking exists at all

The banking looks like showmanship. It was a solution to a problem that had no other answer.

When Zandvoort was being reworked for its 2021 return, Formula 1 wanted DRS available through the final corner. The sums came back badly. The permissible centrifugal forces would have been exceeded in the finishing bend, and the cars would simply have become too fast at the exit.

Fifteen options were assessed. One was making the preceding corner almost a right angle, so cars would crawl out of it. Every version left the same problem in place.

Banking solved it by changing the direction of the force rather than the speed. The idea came from Zandvoort's track manager, Niek Oude Luttikhuis. He had been to Monza, thought of doing what Indianapolis does, and put it to Formula 1. They replied the same day. Italian designer Dromo drew and built both corners, and its founder Jarno Zaffelli called Zandvoort a hypertrack, on the grounds that nothing else on the calendar does this.

Who originated the banking is told three ways. Autosport, the source cited here, credits Oude Luttikhuis alone. Motorsport Week has him working in consultation with the late FIA race director Charlie Whiting. Formula 1's own site calls it Whiting's idea. This page follows the source it cites.

What banking buys, and what it costs

On a flat corner every bit of the turning force goes through the tyres sideways. Tilt the road and some of that force becomes vertical, pressing the car down rather than pushing it out.

The effect is large. Take a car with grip equal to one g, hold the corner radius constant, and add 18 degrees of banking. The maximum speed through that corner rises by about 40%. A corner good for 200 km/h flat becomes good for 280.

That model is deliberately simple, and it is worth saying where it stops. It assumes grip does not change with speed, which is false for a Formula 1 car, because downforce grows with the square of velocity. The real gain is layered on top of an aerodynamic load the calculation ignores. The direction is right and the magnitude is indicative rather than exact.

The cost lands on the tyres. Banking adds vertical load without the drag penalty that wings would bring, so cars carry more speed and the rubber absorbs it. On a Sprint weekend, with one practice session instead of three, teams get far less time to work out how much that costs them over a stint.

A NASCAR oval is roughly twice as steep

Formula 1 has nothing else like Zandvoort, so the banking most readers have actually seen belongs to stock cars.

Talladega Superspeedway is banked at 33 degrees in the turns and 16.5 through the tri-oval. Thirty three degrees works out at a 64.9% gradient, near enough double Zandvoort's Turn 3, and it is the highest banking on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule. Daytona runs 31 degrees in the turns and 18 in its tri-oval, which is 60.1% and 32.5%.

That last figure deserves a second look. The shallow stretch in front of Daytona's grandstand is banked at the same 18 degrees as the steepest full corner in modern Formula 1.

Bristol needs a correction, because the number in circulation is wrong. Bristol Motor Speedway is very widely cited at 36 degrees, which would place it above Talladega. That figure comes from the 1969 reconfiguration and predates the 2007 resurfacing to progressive banking. Bristol's own media guide gives the corners as variable, 24 to 28 degrees, with the frontstretch at 5 to 9 and the backstretch at 4 to 8. So the real range is a gradient of 44.5% to 53.2%. Still far steeper than Zandvoort, still short of Talladega, and roughly eight degrees below the number most sources print.

No backstretch figure is quoted here for Talladega or Daytona. NASCAR's own pages give Talladega's backstretch as 2 degrees in one place and 3 in another, and those sections are near flat for drainage rather than a meaningful comparison.

By historical standards, 18 degrees is modest

Zandvoort had the steepest banking of any circuit on the modern Formula 1 calendar. Set against the sport's own past it is tame.

Monza's banked oval reached 38.69 degrees at its steepest, an 80% gradient. It carried a world championship round four times, in 1955, 1956, 1960 and 1961. That is the post-1955 oval and not the shallower 1922 banking, which is a different configuration and a common mix-up. AVUS in Berlin, which hosted the 1959 German Grand Prix, is reported at 43 degrees, and Red Bull Racing notes it had no barrier at the top.

Gradients calculated as the tangent of the banking angle. Indianapolis is exactly 9 degrees 12 minutes. Zandvoort and Indianapolis from Red Bull Racing and Formula 1, Talladega from Talladega Superspeedway and NASCAR, Daytona from Daytona International Speedway and NASCAR, Bristol from Bristol Motor Speedway's media guide. AVUS is the one figure here that could not be traced to original circuit documentation. It is consistently attested in secondary sources and is carried on that basis, not on the same footing as the rest.

Modern Formula 1's most extreme corner is less than half as steep as something drivers accepted seventy years ago, without a barrier. That is a fair measure of how much the sport's appetite for risk has changed.

Common questions

How steep is the banking at Zandvoort?

Turn 3, the Hugenholtzbocht, is about 19 degrees. Turn 14, the Arie Luyendykbocht, is 18. As road gradients those are 34.4% and 32.5%. The sources that report the two corners separately, among them The Race and Motorsport Week, agree on that pairing, and Circuit Zandvoort's corners page gives 18 degrees for Arie Luyendyk. Formula 1's own site is inconsistent, publishing both figures for both corners.

Why does Circuit Zandvoort's website say 32 degrees?

The units are transposed. The circuit's presentation page gives the banked corners "a bevel of 18%, or 32 degrees". A gradient of 18% is an angle of 10.2 degrees, and an angle of 32 degrees is a gradient of 62.5%. The correct pairing is 18 degrees, or 32 per cent, since tan(18°) = 0.3249.

Was Monza's banking only 21 degrees?

That figure belongs to a different configuration. Red Bull's Zandvoort guide describes the original Monza banking as maxing out at 21 degrees, which is the 1922 oval. The banking people mean by Monza is the Pista di Alta Velocità rebuilt in 1955, which reached 38.69 degrees and carried four championship rounds.

Is it the steepest banking in Formula 1?

It was the steepest on the modern calendar, roughly double the 9.2 degrees at Indianapolis. Historically it is modest. Monza's oval reached 38.69 degrees and AVUS is reported at 43.

Is Zandvoort steeper than a NASCAR oval?

No, and not by a wide margin either. Talladega is banked at 33 degrees in the turns and Daytona at 31, against Zandvoort's 19. Talladega is the highest banking on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule.

Is Bristol Motor Speedway really banked at 36 degrees?

No. That figure dates from the 1969 reconfiguration and predates the 2007 resurfacing, though it is still widely repeated. Bristol Motor Speedway's own media guide gives the corners as variable, 24 to 28 degrees, with the frontstretch at 5 to 9 and the backstretch at 4 to 8.

Why did they add banking?

Formula 1 wanted DRS through the final corner and the forces would have exceeded what the cars are built for. Fifteen options were assessed. Banking was the one that worked.

Was 2026 the last Dutch Grand Prix?

Yes. Zandvoort chose not to renew beyond 2026. The final running was round 12, from 21 to 23 August 2026, and it carried a Sprint for the first time at the circuit.