taking a bypass from turn 4 to turn 8|alt= Designed as his
thesis by student Óscar Fernández in 1953, the circuit has an elevation of ; the thin air causes difficulties for both the drivers and their cars. It also reduces the levels of
aerodynamic drag that cars experience, meaning that higher downforce setups can be used with less impact on straight-line speed. The circuit has an extremely fast final corner (the
Peraltada, turn 17) before a long start/finish straight, and thus reminded some of
Monza Circuit; however, unlike Monza's
Parabolica curve, the
Peraltada curve is slightly banked, allowing even more speed through the corner. It was at this corner that the younger Rodríguez fatally crashed, due to suspension failure. After the last F1 Mexican Grand Prix in 1992, a baseball stadium called the
"Foro" was built on the inner part of this curve. When the
Champ Car series began using the track in 2002, the
Peraltada curve was partially bypassed by a series of sharp turns entering and exiting the
Foro; re-entering the
Peraltada halfway through. After the Peraltada comes the long front straight. During the original turbo era in Formula One the faster cars were regularly clocking speeds of up to on the straight. In the
2005 NASCAR Busch Series season, there was a
chicane on the main straightaway to slow the cars down. They also introduced a curve between the short course and the Ese del Lago to bypass the latter, but avoiding the stadium detour. The Grand Prix circuit underwent a significant renovation under the direction of
Hermann Tilke for the return of
Formula One in . The front straight was slightly extended and reprofiled to accommodate a new media center and paddock. The iconic esses between turns 7 and 13 were significantly modified; the prolific, high radius turns largely diminished and some replaced with fixed angle turns. The baseball field portion of the track was also altered to a low-speed left-right combination that bypassed the first half of the Peraltada, allowing the cars to re-enter the Peraltada halfway through the corner. At , the course is shorter than the previous Grand Prix layout, and
Mexican Grand Prix organizers predicted lap times of around 75 seconds and speeds in excess of for the
current turbocharged Formula One cars, which eliminate the adverse effects of altitude present in naturally aspirated cars. However, the modern V6 hybrid turbo Formula One cars actually managed to reach top speeds in excess of down the main straight. The maximum speed recorded in a Formula One car was , established at the end of the start/finish straight. == Layout history ==