Ladies First!
Published: 12th March 2008
Author: Words by Stevie Mills Photo by still-mx.co.uk
Dublin gets its GP and MX gets some positive prime-time publicity but it’s Natalie Kane who scores the biggest victory for Ireland this month
It's official – the 2008 Grand Prix of Ireland is GO! Trevor Callaghan from the MCUI confirmed that a three-year deal has been penned with Youthstream securing Ireland's place on the GP calendar until at least 2010.
Ferry House is the venue, situated just 25 miles from Dublin Airport. This modern complex is used to providing hospitality and catering for many thousands of punters over the years. Previously famous for horse racing events, Ferry House has all the required facilities in place to bring an Irish MX GP into the future with grandstands, hard-standing parking and first class hospitality. World motocross is heading the way of AMA supercross and gone be the days that the public would pay good money to stand knee-deep in mud or pay to get towed out of fields after the event in the name of ‘tradition’.
In terms of hotels and entertainment, Dublin is right up there with the key cities in Europe and I have no doubt Ferry House will provide that legendary Irish hospitality to our visitors and the Irish GP will be well supported by both diehard fans and the general public in, er, general.
The traditional Mad March Hare Motocross was run at Donamanagh due to the fact that the much-loved Ballykelly circuit has closed down – much to the detriment of the sport in Northern Ireland. However, that is another story and one which would take up the rest of this month’s magazine if I were to get into a rant going over why and how our sport lost such a fantastic facility.
Anyway, back to the subject in hand. The March Hare continued to serve up what we expect from the pre-season opener - new faces, big crashes and an equal amount of surprises. Honda-mounted teenager Gary Gibson stormed to the first win of 2008 after grabbing the holeshot and recording the fastest lap of the day on a technical circuit. A second holeshot in race two was short-lived as Gary crashed his way down the leaderboard – still, a win could not keep the smile from his face all day.
After limping home in moto one Dave Gorman spanked all-comers in race two on his two-smoker AJ Elite KTM. Drew Goudy seems to have recaptured the fun element of the sport and it showed, the former youth star is looking every bit a potential contender for the quarter-litre championships this season.
When all was said and done it was Mike Sinton who stepped onto the top step of the podium, shadowed by Goudy in the role of bridesmaid and Gibson in third. Sinton, who crashed hard in qualification, rode to 2-3 results without pushing the boat out. “I just rode the track as fast as possible without taking chances - a lot of riders were crashing and could have got hurt here today,” reckoned the Irish #2.
Just south of the border, the North Dublin Club ran their first event of the year at Gormanstown which is pretty much an all-weather track beside the beach with some spectacular jumps. Goudy continued his return to form by taking a win in race one before retiring from the rest of the day’s proceedings. GOMX/ Mulligan Contractor Yamaha’s 17-year-old rider Thomas O'Grady regrouped to win the final two races of the day after retiring with mechanical issues in race one. But it was the smooth consistency of Stefan Byrne that put the Four-Stroke Racing rider on the top step of the podium at the end of the day.
Natalie Kane is warming up for the forthcoming Women's World Cup and the fast lass made her intentions known as she blitzed qualification at the opening round of the ACU British ladies’ series by some 12 seconds. Motovision Suzuki-mounted Natalie won both motos convincingly, taking her second victory of the day with over a two-minute margin.
In the U21 series it was less than a good start for the Irish contingent. Graeme Irwin didn’t make the startline due to a mid-week injury and Pioneer Yamaha's Robert Hamilton crashed out of race one but got an 11th place for his efforts second time out when he recorded some excellent lap times. Hammy, still lacking in bike time, is recovering well from a knee operation which robbed him of the entire ’07 season. His trademark lightning starts should see him back at the front before long.
Moto One Suzuki rider Wayne Garrett showed promise in the Open class with an 8-16 card. Wayne mixed it in good company in race one, showing just how important a start is at this level of racing. And David McCamley enjoyed his first trip across the pond. Although he just missed out in qualification, he redeemed himself by winning both support races in fine style.
Easter and the opening Ulster championship round is just around the corner which will also be held at the Donamanagh venue. Good as the track is, the fact remains the two-day Easter Ulster MX1/MX2 event was always one of the best spectator supported events of the year and Tinkerhill or Seaforde would have been the ‘commercial’ choice. Okay, the tracks are not sandy but both have run successful events in less than perfect race conditions.
The recently televised Insight programme on the Northern Ireland Events Company was actually a positive advertisement for motocross in this country. I was worried that motorcycling in general and MX in particular would have been the scapegoat that was perceived to have been the cause of the downfall of the NIEC.
But during the 30-minute prime-time programme not one detrimental comment was made by anyone interviewed about our sport. The government ministers acknowledged that over 20 million people worldwide would have watched this “spectacular sport” and comments were made about just how professional riders have to be to perform at this level.
See you at the races…