Cape Town Circuit Layout almost Ready

The design, which is exclusively revealed here by Autosport-Atlas, is the second version of the circuit that has now been put forward.

After hefty revisions from the original draft, it is hoped that only minor modifications will be needed before it is given the green light by Bernie Ecclestone later this year.

The track has been designed by Hermann Tilke and is very reminiscent of his concept for the Bahrain circuit.

As this exclusive image shows, the first half of the track features some tight corners and long straights, while the second half features more high-speed challenges.

David Gant, the chief executive of the consortium planning the Cape Town bid, told Autosport-Atlas: "Hermann has been to South Africa twice and the last time he came was at Christmas. Then there was a provisional layout about two months ago that we've networked back home with the motor sport enthusiasts and the people involved in the sport.

"Now we've got our second layout, which looks to be very close to what we will finally accept, and then it goes on to designing the infrastructure, the paddock buildings and then presenting it to FOM.

"Hopefully, by the time we want to sign a contract with Bernie [Ecclestone], hopefully at the end of the year, we will have all that in place. So we are confident. Maybe naively, but we have committed in terms of laying out the planning and we have a
commercial relationship with Hermann now."