Motorcycle Speedway

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Motorcycle Speedway

By Anna Dziedzic
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Motorcycle speedway
Motorcycle speedway is a motorcycle sport
involving four and sometimes up to six riders
competing over four anti-clockwise laps of an
oval circuit. Speedway motorcycles use only one
gear and have no brakes, or gearbox. This sport
is especially popular in Great Britain, Denmark,
Sweden and in Poland.
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Polish name zuzel (slag) and popular term
black sport came from times when only the slag
was used as a base material on the track.
Nowadays, the track surface consists of four
layers of grading shale, granite, brick granules
or other loose material of which no individual
piece can be over 7 millimetres in size have
replaced slag granules. More common name of this
sport is the speedway.
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Beginnings
This sport has its beginning in early 20s of
twentieth century. Races were irregular, and only
ordinary road motorcycles were used. Grass fields
or other flat surfaces were the very first places
where the first speedway races were held. The
first speedway meeting took place on 15 December
1923 at the Maitland Showground in the Lower
Hunter Valley, New South Wales, Australia.
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Variations
An international individual speedway championship
has taken various forms since its beginnings in
the 1930s. Each of these forms vary - the type of
surface may be different, length of track, too.
Different world regions have their favourite
speedway types too, of course.
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The oldest and most popular variety is called
classic slag, which is held on the tracks with
a length of 260-425 on loose surface (brick,
slag, shale, granite granules). The length of the
track may change race specificication. Tracks up
to 300 m (i.e. technical), which are popular in
Great Britain, are more demanding as far as
racers skills are concerned. The most popular
tracks in Poland vary from 320 m to 400m. Races
consist of four riders racing over four laps.This
variety is the most popular in Poland, Sweden and
the UK as these countries have the most developed
speedway leagues in the world.
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In some countries of former USSR very popular
variation of speedway is ice speedway. This type
of racing features racing on frozen surfaces. The
sport uses bikes enhanced for the terrain. Bikes
have studded tyres, longer wheelbase and more
rigid frame.
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Any motor sport expose competitors to danger. In
the case of speedway it is especially frequent as
participants have immediate contact with
themselves. However, only small number of
accidents poses serious consequences. In the
history of Polish speedway there are only 40
fatal accidents. In the honor of dead racers many
tournaments are held annually.
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Bibliography
http//pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sport_C5BCuC5BC
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