There are fears that motorcycle racing in Northern Ireland may never return, after last week’s shock announcement that all racing has been cancelled for 2023 due to a huge hike in insurance costs.

Enniskillen and District Motorcycle Club are just one of the clubs that have been forced to cancel events this year following a meeting of the Ulster Centre of the Motorcycle Union of Ireland, and local club Chairman Rodney Shaw fears that the decision will have a long lasting effect on the future of the sport.

“If it is forced to take a year out, it is going to be very difficult to come back,” he admitted.

“A lot of those boys will have to try to sell their bikes. You take the tens of millions of pounds worth of racing equipment in this country that is now left useless – I don’t know how it going to come back unless you can get an insurance company that is going to talk sensible figures.

“We are all sitting in shock.”

The Ulster Centre felt they had no option but to pull the plug on their season’s competitive activities following a massive increase in the cost of insurance required to run both road races and also short circuit events.

In addition to the loss of the North West 200, other events to be axed include the Enniskillen club’s event based at Bishopscourt, and the Irish Masters Championship at Mondello, where Ballinamallard’s Josh Elliott won the Supersport title in 2022.

Rodney Shaw attended the Ulster Centre meeting last week, hoping that the member clubs could come together to meet the dramatic rise in costs, but in the end the sums of money required to commit to the upcoming season proved a step too far.

“Last year, the overall quote was around £170,000, but the equivalent to that this year was £480,000, and they said they wanted £400,000 of excess, so as a centre we had to have over £800,000 sitting,” explained Rodney.

“The governing body said they would stand over the excess, but the cost is divided up and the clubs had to say yes or no.

“We were planning to run a short circuit event at Bishopscourt, as we did last year, and we had paid our deposit.

“Initially this was to be a 10 per cent increase, but they came back and said that figure had gone from about £3,000 to £7,750.

Emergency meeting

“We called an emergency club meeting on Wednesday night and the club took the decision we were going to go ahead.

“It was going to be hard, and we were going to do a lot of extra work and get more sponsorship, but we thought we needed to go on because if it stopped, then it was going to be very hard to get it back.

“We were prepared to take a loss in the hope something better might come along in the future.”

Although the Enniskillen club had decided they could stretch to meet the increase, the share of the pot they had to cover increased when other clubs decided they could not meet the price rises.

Their withdrawal increased the share for the remaining clubs, and as each club’s financial commitment rose, so more clubs pulled out.

“We were still in the hat, and then another club dropped out, and we were still in the hat, but then more started dropping out – and that was it,” Shaw revealed.

“We were down to the last few clubs prepared to pay, but in the end we just didn’t have the option to continue.

“We talked about going to the Government to see if they could help or support or guide us, but it always came back to the fact they were not sitting [at Stormont].”

‘Devastating for some’

The North West 200 is the highest-profile casualty of the cancellations, and the economic impact on the North Coast will surely run into millions, but Shaw reckons the personal impact on both competitors and spectators will be devastating for some.

“It is a sad, sad end,” he reflected. “It is a way of life to some of those riders.

“The likes of Paul Gartland in Ederney has been racing for 20 years, and then you just take that away from him and riders like him.

“For those boys, it’s their life. They don’t know anything else.

“I would say their mental health is going to be affected and there will be people who will struggle to deal with it.

“I went to the North West as a child and it’s hard to take in,” he continued.

“Something that you have been doing for almost 50 years of your life, and all of a sudden it’s not happening any more.

“It’s a family thing, as well. My father brought me, and I brought my children. That option now has been taken away from my children. They are not going to be able to bring their children.

“We have been at this for over 100 years, and all through The Troubles they managed to keep going.

“An Ulster and Ireland championship ran side by side, and you had Irish riders coming North to compete in the Ulster Championship, and the Ulster riders going South to compete in the Irish championship, week in and week out, and there was never any fighting or arguments.

“In Enniskillen, we are just a small piece of the pie, but for those on the North Coast it is huge.

“There is not a hotel or bed and breakfast on the North Coast that is not already booked out – and it is not just in the North Coast, it’s affecting the country as a whole.”

Since the shock announcement last week, the road racing community has been galvanised, and moves are afoot to try to reverse the decision.

A Gofundme page has been set up and has already raised more than £65,000 towards its target of £300,000, and the North West 200 organisers, Coleraine & District Motor Club, said they have not given up the fight – but despite the adverse reaction to the decision, the future of the sport still hangs in the balance.

 

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