Short Track Racing
Short Track Racing: Short Track action at Peterborough on 17/18 May.
By Admin
May 8, 2008, 08:38

History is made next weekend (May 17th. and 18th.) at the East of England Showground in Peterborough, with the first-ever staging of the Champions of Short Track - a Grand Prix-style event for the increasingly popular dirt track motorcycle racing discipline of Short Track UK.
 
STUK has staged championship rounds on the Peterborough Speedway circuit within the main stadium arena at the Showground (in Awalton) for each of the past two years; and the venue was also chosen last season for the sport's first-ever World Team Cup event when England prevailed over the continental European challenge of the Netherlands, Switzerland and Italy plus a team from the USA.
 
It is from the States that this hugely exciting brand of dirttrack racing originates (known there as Flattrack); and the exciting format sees adapted Supermoto, Motocross, Enduro or Dirt Track machines (remarkably ranging in size all the way from 125cc all the way up to 1200cc) locked together in no-holds barred combat in 12 rider, six laps plus races in frantic and exciting action.
 
No fewer than 40 of Europe's best including Italian master Marco Belli (the current STUK champion), descend on the East of England Showground this weekend, taking centre stage as the main racing event within the huge BMF Show.
 
Saturday will see the heats of the inaugural Champions of Champions event, with the action underway in earnest from 10.30am and the order of the day: qualification, GP style, for the Finals event on Sunday.
 
As well as Belli, the continental challenge is led by two fellow Italians, Luca Talamona and European champion, Jacopo Monti.  Home-grown talent comes in the form of reigning British Thunderbikes champion, Peter Boast (once a Speedway rider with King's Lynn) and fellow Market Rasen racer, Tim Greig: runner-up in last year's Pan-European, MEFO Flattrack Cup.  Local challenges are also raised by Stamford brothers, the 'Raging Bulls', Victor and Geoff Bull; plus Skooter Farm Team rider, Gary Inman from Spalding and Whitlesey's Steve Coles. New to the series this term are two more riders with a distinguished Speedway riding pedigree, another former King's Lynn Star, Adam Allott and Aidan Collins, nephew of the legendary former World Speedway champion and one-time star of TV's Superstars, Peter Collins.
 
The 'superstar' of this particular event will be determined in the finals event on Sunday from 1.30pm, where the top 24 to emerge from Saturday's action get serious in pursuit of the crown of Champion of Short Track - culminating in an 18 heat winner-takes-all Grand Final.  That will be the longest Short Track race ever staged in this country and is a must-see event among a whole range of attractions at the ever-popular BMF Show.
 
These include the Men in Black staging racing on Speedway bikes from across the decades; at the other end of the age range, a junior class for the nation's top junior Short Track racers, including the unbeaten Tom Woolley from Burton-on-Trent and Wisbech-based pretender to his national junior championship crown, teenager Tom Welbourn; the thrills and spills of the amazing Moped Enduro race with the Peterborough circuit literally invisible due to the sheer volume of souped up 50cc machines in action; The Royal Artillery's Flying Gunners motorcycle display team; plus further harum-scarum attractions in the form of  the all-new ‘Extreme Globeriders’, bike riding inside a wire mesh sphere plus that good old standard, the 'Wall of Death'.  There's top music acts too with the main attraction on Saturday night being legendary punk rock combo, The Damned.

Admission on the day is adult £16 and family £35 - with significant reductions for tickets booked in advance and on-line with details available from www.bmfshows.co.uk