Editing AVUS (section)

===Race track===
At the time of opening, AVUS was {{cvt|19.569|km|mi|abbr=on}} long – each straight being approximately half that length, and joined at each end by flat, large-radius curves, driven counter-clockwise.

While the [[Grand Prix motor racing]] scene still evaded German tracks, the circuit from 1922 was also the site of [[Motorcycle racing|motorcycle races]]. On 11 July 1926 the track played host to the first international [[German Grand Prix]] for sports cars, organised by the Automobilclub von Deutschland, the former KAC. The 1921 roadway turned out to be insufficient: Already, in practice two days before, the young Italian driver Enrico Platé (not to be confused with the Argentinian driver and team owner of the same name) was involved in a crash that killed his mechanic. During the race, in heavy rain, two track marshals died when [[Adolf Rosenberger]] lost control and hit the indicator board and the timekeeper's box, with a third employee succumbing to his injuries in hospital a few hours later. The Grand Prix was won by his fellow team-member, the so-far unknown [[Mercedes-Benz]] salesman [[Rudolf Caracciola]], from [[Remagen]], driving a private, eight-cylinder "Monza" [[Kompressor (Mercedes-Benz)|Kompressor]] type. The fastest lap of {{cvt|161|km/h|mph|abbr=on}} was set by [[Ferdinando Minoia]] in an [[Officine Meccaniche|OM]].

From 1927 the German Grand Prix was relocated to the new and more secure [[Nürburgring]] circuit in the Western German [[Eifel]] range, while the AVUS received a new [[Asphalt concrete|asphalt]] surface and served as an experimental track for [[rocket car]]s.

On 23 May 1928 [[Fritz von Opel]] ("Rocket Fritz") achieved a speed record of {{convert|238|km/h|abbr=on}} in an [[Opel RAK2]].

Due to the [[Great Depression]] annual auto races were not resumed until 1931, when Caracciola again won in a [[Mercedes-Benz SSK]], succeeded by [[Manfred von Brauchitsch]] the next year after Caracciola had switched to [[Alfa Romeo]].

The competition on 22 May 1932 saw further notable participants like the [[Francis Curzon, 5th Earl Howe|Earl Howe]], [[Hans Stuck]] and Sir [[Malcolm Campbell]]. The [[Czechoslovakia|Czechoslovak]] driver, Prince George Christian of [[House of Lobkowicz|Lobkowicz]], died when his [[Bugatti Type 54]] crashed in the southern hairpin. The following events were won by [[Achille Varzi]] (1933) and [[Guy Moll]] (1934), to the great annoyance of the new [[Nazi Germany|Nazi]] rulers, who declared the victory of German drivers and cars a matter of national pride. They strongly backed the construction of the new [[Silver Arrows]] (''Silberpfeile'') generation of Mercedes-Benz and [[Auto Union]].

In 1935 [[Luigi Fagioli]] won the race in a [[Mercedes-Benz W25]]; however, the track was no longer adequate for cars reaching average race speeds of far over {{convert|200|km/h|0|abbr=on}}. In an effort to make AVUS the "world's fastest race track", the 1936 season was skipped and while the track hosted the [[Cycling at the 1936 Summer Olympics|cycling]] road race, the marathon and 50&nbsp;km walk [[Athletics at the 1936 Summer Olympics|athletic]] events of the [[1936 Summer Olympics]], the north curve was turned into a steeply banked turn (43°) made of bricks.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.goldenera.fi/gp3703.htm#15 |title=1937 Grand Prix Season – Part 2 |website=The Golden Era of Grand Prix Racing |access-date=2007-11-18 |archive-date=2014-09-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140924134848/http://www.kolumbus.fi/leif.snellman/gp372.htm#15 |url-status=dead }}</ref> It became dubbed the ''wall of death'', especially as it had no retaining barrier, so cars that missed the turn easily flew off it.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.goldenera.fi/t2.htm |title=Tracks-Germany |website=The Golden Era of Grand Prix Racing |access-date=2007-11-18 |archive-date=2020-11-08 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201108070630/http://www.kolumbus.fi/leif.snellman/t2.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref> The Silver Arrows raced only once on the banked version, in [[1937 Grand Prix season|1937]]. As the AVUS race did not count towards the championship, non-GP cars were allowed, which permitted the use of streamlined cars, similar to the cars used for high speed record attempts. This race was run in two heats; during qualifying for the second heat, Luigi Fagioli stuck his Auto Union Type C on pole position, with a time of 4 minutes and 8.2 seconds at an average speed of {{cvt|284.31|km/h|mph|abbr=on}} - which was the fastest motor racing lap in history until this time was bettered by [[Tony Bettenhausen]] in qualifying for the 1957 [[Race of Two Worlds]] at Monza. It was also bettered by four drivers during the 1971 Indianapolis 500. Mercedes driver [[Hermann Lang]]'s average race speed of about {{convert|276|km/h|mph|abbr=on}} was the fastest road race in history for nearly five decades, and was not matched on a high-speed banked-circuit until the mid-1980s at the 1986 Indianapolis 500.<ref>[http://racing-reference.info/race/1986_Indianapolis_500/UO#15 "1986 Indianapolis 500". racing-reference.info. Racing Reference.]</ref>

No major race was held after 1937 as, in early 1938, the popular German race driver [[Bernd Rosemeyer]] was killed in a land speed record attempt on a straight section of the Autobahn [[Frankfurt]]–[[Darmstadt]] (present-day [[Bundesautobahn 5]]), at which point the high-speed AVUS was considered too dangerous for the fast Grand Prix race cars. Furthermore, it was to be connected to the growing ''[[Reichsautobahn]]'' network in 1940 by extending it south towards the [[Bundesautobahn 10|Berliner Ring]], therefore the original hairpin at [[Nikolassee]] was demolished and replaced by a junction. A planned banked south turn was never built; the cleared grounds in the [[Grunewald forest]] were used as a proving ground ("Keerans Range") by the [[United States Army|American]] occupation forces after [[World War II]].