Bordeaux

The increasing interest in motor racing in post-war France encouraged Automobile Club du Sud-Ouest president Louis Baillot d’Estivaux to establish a non-championship F1 race in Bordeaux. Out-of-city venues at Pyla-Plage and near St-Emilion were rejected before a street course on the banks of the River Garonne was established in 1951. The clockwise circuit featured hairpins at either end of the Quai Louis XVIII, with a section that wound around the Place des Quinconces. A lesser meeting for national sports cars was held in 1952 due to F1’s temporary demise, and the direction of travel had been reversed to anticlockwise by the time the GP returned for F2 cars in May 1953. Jean Behra led from start-to-finish in April 1955 before racing was abandoned due to that year’s Le Mans disaster.