About | Subscribe | History | Privacy Policy | Site Policies | Credits & Buttons | Contact AerialF1
Welcome to AerialF1
Introduction
AerialF1 is authored by Ollie White and started out as a quick look at all the race tracks used for the Formula One season. The aerial images were used to illustrate the season calendar at AerialF1’s sister site, OllieF1. However, it wasn’t long before the search widened and lesser used circuits were hunted down. Before Oliver knew what was happening, he was obsessed with finding them all.
In a bid to share his findings with the world, Oliver posted all the tracks he found at OllieF1 in the now defunct Circuits area of the site. It wasn’t long though before Oliver realised that all this information needed a home to itself, and so AerialF1 was born. Although it is far from complete, and arguably will never be complete, this is the creation of the Internet’s largest gathering of circuit information, images and layouts.
For the record, Ollie is also obsessed with Formula One and writes for OllieF1 whenever he can gleam a spare five minutes from his already hectic life. He likes coffee, surfing, songs he can sing along to, watching Family Guy and House MD. Some of Ollie’s other musings can be read at his irregularly-updated personal site, iam.ollief1.
Ollie can also never decide if he prefers Ollie or Oliver, and inter-changes them without warning.
Navigation
At the top of each page, just under the header and in the dark grey strip, is the main navigation of the site. Here is listed the seven major areas of the world (or generally speaking, the continents), and from here you will be able to access various countries that geographically fall in each area.
For each circuit, there will be a link to download a KMZ file, which pinpoints the circuit in Google Earth. You will need this program in order to open the file. Alternatively, there will also be a second link enabling you to view the circuit in Google Maps. And if available, there will also be a link to view the circuit using Google Street View.
You may have noticed that some countries fall outside their political area, an example being French Polynesia listed under Oceania. Not wanting to politicise anything to do with the simple categorisation of the circuits and the countries in which they are located, Oliver has instead chosen to place the countries in the general geographic region. Although Hawaii is listed under North America, the islands being the fiftieth state of America.
You may also notice that some countries have been perhaps incorrectly separated, an example being Republic of China (Taiwan) and the People’s Republic of Chine (erm, China). This is simply to help with searching and in an attempt to ensure the pages don’t become too much of a blur with one flag taking dominance over the others. And to be perfectly honest, Oliver doesn’t understand the blurb given on each of the Wikipedia entries.
Credits
The flag icons used all over the site are part of a fantastic collection by Bartleme Design.
Any other icon used (occasionally in the sidebars) are a part of the Silk set of icons created by Mark James of FamFamFam fame.
AerialF1 would not be possible without the fantastic Google Earth program, although this website has no association or affiliation with Google or any of its companies and products. The images used on the circuit pages are copyrighted to Google as shown in the image and in the external Google Earth program and Google Maps.
Community
AerialF1 isn’t the first website to list racing tracks from all over the world, and credit is deserved to a few individuals who have produced some stunning sites that are jam-packed full of information and have helped and inspired Ollie in his project. In the order Ollie found them…
- Darren Galphin’s Tracks Around The World
- Daniel King’s Motor Racing Circuits Database
- Neil Tipton’s e-Tracks: World Motor Racing Circuits
- Guido de Carli’s Circuito Nel Mondo
Ollie intends to write more about these sites when AerialF1 is better established and when he’s on top of the publishing schedule.
Final Word
AerialF1 is forever evolving and will never be finished. It is a crazy project that at times, Oliver wishes he had never started. As always, there will be mistakes and often it is hard to decide fact from fiction. Many times a circuit will have more than one name, or its name may actually be changed, or another name may reflect a different part of the circuit’s complex. Also, the contact information (where provided) may be out-of-date or external websites may no longer be active. Oliver will try his best to be accurate and up-to-date, but with several thousand circuits listed, it isn’t an easy job.
If you notice a mistake, be it a wrong name for a circuit or some information that is out-of-date, please feel free to pop down the error in the Contact Form. It is available 24/7/365 and Oliver will do his best to respond and correct. Running multiple successful sites isn’t easy though, so please be patient. And also of note, it seems the Contact Form doesn’t like links too much, so feel free to drop the http:// part from the link should you wish to add one to your email.
AerialF1 is still under construction from a design point of view as well, and therefore doesn’t fully as it should in Internet Explorer. Ollie hopes that it is appreciated that listing the circuits is a job for many people unto itself, let alone the task of presenting an aesthetically pleasing and functional site. Some of the Google Earth downloads aren’t quite ready yet, but do check back regularly as are they are continuously being added and updated.
As always, Oliver loves feedback, and the Contact Form is always open as long as the site is live on the Internet.
Enjoy AerialF1.
Add comment