I have always been a bikie. Four years of Moto-X, swung in the chair for an Australian champ and even ran laps on a speedway bike. Sounds good till you find out I was a woeful Moto-X rider, my time in the chair was three laps and I bit his leg off and made him come in, and the speedway outing was private practice and totaled 20 laps, (but I was 40 years of age, and should have known better).
However, in a spare hour last weekend I found the Speedway GP (SGP) on You Tube on my smart TV. All the shoulder to shoulder action of the speedway, marketed in a slick package for television. The rough and ready aspect of speedway riders in black leathers, as I remembered it from my boyhood, has apparently long since gone.
Professionalism has come to the dirt – the riders even carry brushes to keep their colorful leathers clean between heats.
So, as well as Moto-GP for action, you also have the choice of Speedway (SGP) as well. Formula 1 is going to have to look critically at the package it is offering to the spectators at present. It is no good relying on the fact that Formula 1 began in 1950 and there is history and tradition. Speedway racing came from Australia to the UK in the 1920’s.
The bikes themselves are very simple and the following regulations apply:
Machines used must:
Weigh no less than 77 kg (unfuelled)
Use a four-stroke, single-cylinder engine with one carburettor and one spark plug and a maximum capacity of 500 cc
Have guards fitted over moving engine parts where reasonable
Use an additional chain guard to prevent a hand or fingers being cut at the nip point where the chain meets the sprocket by a chain
Have a peg fitted to prevent a broken primary chain flailing and injuring a rider or a fellow competitor
Use shatter resistant plastics where reasonable
Be fitted with a dirt deflector
Be fuelled by methanol with no additives
Be fitted with an approved silencer
Have a handlebar width greater than 650 mm and less than 850 mm.
Machines used cannot:
Be constructed in any part from Titanium
Use uncoated ceramic parts
Use telemetry during a race except for timing purposes
Use any electronic components to control the engine
Use brakes of any form
Use supercharger or a turbocharger of any kind.
Simple and effective and easily checked by the scrutineers. Everyone knows the regulations and the result of each competition depends upon the skill of the rider, forget ‘strategy’ and tyre choices and even the scoring has remained the same 3-2-1-0 for the four riders in the heats.
Speedway is an understandable weekly competition and F1 has much to learn from it.
