I watched practice and qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix yesterday. Unlike the poor, benighted souls who are actually at the Island, I watched it from the warmth and comfort of my office at home. To say that I felt extreme sympathy for everyone who had to endure those horrific conditions is an understatement. Needless to say it reminded me only too painfully of many race meetings that I have attended over the years where the weather decided to do its worst.
Phillip Island, situated near the southernmost extremes of Victoria, is ideally (!) situated to cop the sort of weather that it regularly does.
South of it there are no land masses to break up the squalls that sweep in from Bass Straight and travelling south will get you to Antarctica from whence much of the foul weather emanates. And so the truism that, if you don’t like the weather at PI, just wait 5 minutes and it will change has grown up and it was never truer than it was in this case. Now I have to say that the weekend that I last went to the MotoGp meeting (many years ago) the weather was excellent, and I had the opportunity of enjoying seeing the home town hero do his stuff. But the weather in Springtime in Australia IS changeable, everyone knows that and short of moving the event to another time slot, nothing is going to change that. I have to say that, in my many visits there (mostly in January for the Island Classic), the weather has been excellent and I delight is refuting the naysayers who constantly say, “Every time you go there the weather is awful.” Moving the event to another venue where the weather could be a little more amenable is also out of the question because it is “locked in” to PI for a long while into the future (2027?)
As far as changing the timing for the event, which some have suggested, that is really a fool’s errand as well. Fact is that Melbourne weather is notoriously fickle as anyone who has visited there knows and moving it to another time is NO guarantee that scenes like those we saw yesterday would not be repeated. Added to this, the timing of the event, close to the end of the season and perfectly placed to take advantage of the nervy, “championships-are-being-decided” period would be a big loss to the event. In recent years that uncertainty has helped to attract big crowds and has been a big drawcard for the event. This year has seen numerous other Grands Prix blighted by bad weather in other parts of the world where they are held so there is no guarantee that other promoters would be amenable to changing the dates of their event just to accommodate us. The issue of the planning the “fly away” rounds, Motegi, Australia and Sepang, needs to also be considered. I doubt DORNA would want to go to the expense of coming to the Southern Hemisphere twice when there is no compelling reason why they should.
So the fans, the officials, the marshals and the long-suffering riders are all faced with the possibility of today being a repeat of yesterday, a situation that benefits no-one. Looking at it on the live feed reminded me of the horrendous conditions at Hume Weir in January 1978 and some other meetings I have attended that were run in similar, appalling conditions. I guess we should be grateful that at least we still RACE in the rain, not like other racing formulae where the racing stops if the track gets wet.
“Warm the set and cool the tinnies” was the catchphrase from the “Life – Be In It” advertisement. Best advice for today, I think.
Oh, and on another motorcycle-related matter, congratulations to Greg Hancock who clinched his 4th World Speedway Championship last night in Melbourne. The stadium has a closing roof so the event went ahead without the weather disruption that PI had experienced. Until such time as someone can design and build a closing roof over the PI track, I think we’re stuck with what we’ve got. 🙂