10 years ago today (12 Nov)

[hoffy]

OK, this is probably a bit of a sob story and yes, I should get over it, but there are probably many like me, so I thought I would share.

Today marks the 10 year anniversary of the last GP to be held on the Adelaide street circuit. Being a native of South Australia (the Australian State, for which Adelaide is the capital)and growing up in the 80's the Grand Prix years mean so much to me.

The thing is Adelaide has always had an image problem. To the rest of Australia (let alone the world), Adelaide was the sleepy city, where not much happens. But this doesn't mean that the city didn't have any vision. This vision came to fruition in 1985, with the 50th running of the Australian Grand Prix, the first to be run for Formula 1 world championship points.

This race was the idea of local identity Kym Bonythyn (SP?) (A former speedway promotor) and with the backing of the then Local John Bannon Labour government. Finally Adelaide had a signiture event that it could call its own (Relative to Australia anyway!).

For the next 10 years Adelaide showed Australia (and the rest of the world) that it could successfully stage such events. The good thing about this was the way the majority of the city embraced the event. Yes there were objectors, but not to the extent as was found in Melbourne (and still can be). This was helped by the fact that the Adelaide race was traditionally the last race of the year. It was party time in Adelaide and it appears that the whole city was jumping.

And what a golden era of racing it was as well. With names such as Lauda, Rosberg, Jones, Piquet, Prost, Mansell, Senna, Schumacher, Hill(Damon), Hakkinen, Berger, Alesi, (I could go on). And the cars. This was the period of the high horspower turbo cars. Never again will we see such as quest for power as we did during this time.

But now it is ten years on and F1 has probably out grown Adelaide. Like most other Adelaideians, we feel ripped off, with the underhanded way the race was lost, but thats just Bernie (and Ron Walker). ITs probably true, that F1 would have not lasted in Adelaide much longer, but at least it would have been better to have a fair fight.

Anyway, the Australian GP lives on. But that being said, the race in Melbourne is just not the same. It doesn't have the party feel that Adelaide had. To Melbourne, its just another event.

To Adelaide it was the event

Anyhow thanks for listening

Hoffy