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Accurate information on the lengths of straights in Formula One is hard to come by, often with very different lengths from different websites and sources, so I have done my best to find the real lengths of the longest straights from reliable sources.

The longest straight on the 2012 calendar is in fact at the Shanghai International Circuit at a whopping 1170m. The second longest straight is at the Korea International Circuit, just 10m less than Shanghai at 1160m long. The long back straight in Abu Dhabi is another 20m shorter than Korea, 1140m long, sometimes said to be shorter due to the narrowing of the track before the corner, which is a bit odd. The pit straight at Monza is the fourth longest at 1120m long, which quite surprised me as I always thought it was shorter than that. And at last at the fifth longest straight in 2012, the Buddh International Circuit has a back straight at just 1060m.

However, the longest straight EVER used in Formula One is none of these, nor is it the 1475m straight at the Fuji Speedway (though that is the longest in recent years). The longest is at the Pescara Circuit, used once in F1 back in 1957, also the longest ever lap in F1, a massive 25.579km long lap. There is no precise length of the straight as it was a long time ago, but it was around 6 to 6.5km long, around six times that of India!

You may have noticed I haven’t added the straight at the Circuit of The Americas in this, but at the moment I can’t find any information I trust, only that it’s apparently 1.2km, but some sites also say China, Korea and Abu Dhabi are all 1.2km and they’re not.