The track was conceived in 1956 by Jim Vaill, who together with John Fitch and Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory built the venue applying state-of-the-art road and highway safety principles. The first race took place on 28 April 1957, with Ted Sprigg winning the G-Production class in an Alfa Romeo Giulietta and Charles Callanan winning the MG class in an MG TC.
In 1959, Lime Rock hosted a notable upset: Rodger Ward won a Formula Libre race in an Offenhauser-engined midget car normally used on oval tracks, using power-to-weight advantage and dirt-track cornering technique to defeat more fancied sports cars. The same year the track hosted the Little Le Mans race, won by Charles Callanan and Roger Penske in a Fiat Abarth.
The track attracted many celebrated drivers during its early decades. Paul Newman raced in support of his own Newman-Haas team alongside Bob Sharp. Mario Andretti, Stirling Moss, Dan Gurney, Sam Posey, and Mark Donohue all competed at Lime Rock. Sections of the circuit are named for Posey and Newman.
Shortly after opening, Lime Rock faced community resistance. In 1959 the Lime Rock Protective Association, with support from the nearby Trinity Episcopal Church, brought the park to Litchfield Superior Court seeking a ban on Sunday racing. The court issued a permanent injunction against Sunday racing, upheld by the Connecticut Supreme Court. The carefully crafted injunction also preserved the track's right to conduct unmuffled sports car racing on Fridays and Saturdays and testing on Tuesdays. The injunction remains in effect to the present day.
Lime Rock is a natural terrain road course constructed over hilly terrain in the Litchfield Hills, part of the greater Appalachian mountain range. The venue features no grandstands or bleacher seating; instead, spectators bring chairs and blankets to enjoy racing from grassy hillside areas beneath the trees.
For years the track was listed as 1.530 miles — a measurement originally taken using a car's odometer after construction. Following the 2008 reconstruction, accurate survey showed each of the four possible configurations to be 1.500 miles, plus or minus a few hundred feet. The IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship gives the track distance as 1.474 miles. The classic configuration comprises seven turns; the optional layouts run to eight, nine, and ten turns respectively.
In 2008 the track was repaved and two new corner complexes were added. The Rolex Sports Car Series, American Le Mans Series, and IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship have used a configuration incorporating a chicane at turn five and West Bend.
Skip Barber, a former race car driver who founded the Skip Barber Racing School in 1975, owned Lime Rock from 1984 until April 2021. The track is now owned by Lime Rock Group, LLC.
Lime Rock's events calendar has included the Trans-Am Series Trans Am Memorial Day Classic, the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, and the IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship, along with club events from SCCA and NASA. Historic events hosted at Lime Rock include the American Le Mans Series Northeast Grand Prix, the Atlantic Championship Series, the Barber Pro Series, the SCCA L&M Continental 5000 Championship, and the International Race of Champions.
The fastest unofficial all-time track record is 43.112 seconds, set by P. J. Jones in a Toyota Eagle MkIII during qualifying for the 1993 Toyota Trucks Lime Rock Grand Prix.
Lime Rock Park is among the American road courses reproduced in iRacing. Its combination of smooth, compact corners, natural terrain undulation, and the absence of run-off in some areas replicates a challenging and distinctive environment. The track's short lap time — under a minute in many classes — produces intense racing with minimal gaps between competitors, a quality that translates directly to iRacing's online competition formats.