Is Wimbledon Stadium the UK's last winter Motorsport venue?

[Stephen H]

There used to be plenty of racing in winter.

There used to be FF2000 Grandstand Championship that run into November at Brands, then there used to be regular Rallycross till the circuit racing resumed in March.

Lydden used to have its monthly winter/super series for Rallycross.

Today we have one off events

Arena Essex has the Rolling Thunder show expo in Jan

Angmering Raceway has a meeting or two in the winter.

There is the South Down Stages at Goodwood and the Brands Hatch Stages.

But Wimbledon Stadium runs weekly from end of October to mid March.

Is this the only regularly used winter Motorsport venue left, or is there something else out there?

Sadly Wimbledon is under threat. It's London's last oval, and London's last Motorsport venue, is it also the last venue in weekly use through out the winter?

[adam46]

Depends what weekly use is for you. All the tracks have testing pretty much every week throughout the winter months...

[Rob29]

Sadly spectators are not as hardy as we used to be-few turn out in summer as there is plenty to watch on TV.

[medius]

Apart from 2013, there was always the traditional Plum Pudding meeting at Mallory on Boxing Day.

[The Fat Clerk]

Coventry had a cracking meeting on Boxing Day.

[ScotsBrutesFan]

Knockhill has held a stages rally on the first Saturday of the Year, for the last few years, the 2012 event was run in 2 foot deep snow.

[chunder]

Wimbledon used to run all the time, but sadly has coenm under a lot of rpessure coz of the rules about truck emissions. A lot of the teams running stock cars and bangers run older buses and trucks and they get charged a bomb for emissions zones as a result, so alot of the bigger mettings have had to be dumped.

Shame as its a great little place, but like most short ovals is struggling

Coventry is in the process of being sold, in fact has been sold, we only have three yeras to find another replacement or that is one of the biggest venues gone.

the owner has tried his best but cant hold on losing money forever (basicaly not losing but seeing value go up and up and not selling) So he hs finally sold it. But I doubt it will be replaced with anything.

[Stephen H]

Hadn't heard about Coventry. Sad news. The prospect of losing any venue is not good, especially a major shale one. What about the Speedway team?

Have to say while not the heady numbers of the golden years, the ovals I attend still pull in reasonable crowds.

I know Arena Essex went from weekly to fortnightly meetings.

But in recent years Wimbledon has gone the other way, to weekly meetings, (though the banner on the stadium still says fortnightly.)

Only the old back straight is open at Wimbledon, but what is open is busy most weeks, and was very busy for the opening round of the banger world series. And my local summer track, Arlington, still attracts a decent crowd on a wednesday evening, especially during the school holidays.

It was sad to loose "Short Circuit magazine" a while back, but it doesn't feel like the sport is in decline is in deline. So it's a shame to still be losing venues.

With regard to Winter, I was thinking of racing meetings, rather than testing, track days, etc. And more than one or two winter events.

I was just wondering if any other track was running regular events, like Wimbledon?

[EastonNeston]

Most Kart circuits have their monthly championship meetings throughout the year.

[Stephen H]

Still trying to get my head round the closure of Coventry in its 60th year.

What have the spectator numbers been like and car counts?

Was there any noise restrictions that were causing it problems?

[expaddockrunner]

Coventry Bees promoter Mick Horton has declared “the hard work starts now” following the news that Brandon Stadium is set to cease as a sporting venue in 2016.

Horton has committed himself to efforts to secure a new venue in the area for motorsport, sentiments shared by outgoing owner Avtar Sandhu who remains heavily involved in the stock car scene.

[chunder]

Nothing wrong at all with Coventry, yes it is not in the best spot for a track, but it has been there for tens of years and I dont think they have huge noise issues.

The problem was the bloke that owns it is a property developer, tried to do several things with it (maybe because it migtht have been unable to be built on houses wise) and as of now wants to sell it indeed apparently has sold it, althought to be fiar he did spend a bit on it and also enjoyed the racing so he says. The land mass is huge and likely worth tens of millions, but not sure what will be uilt there, loacls arenot going to want flats, but you could build an access road and branch roads, the land is so large.

But there is the niggling stuff, papers have alleged part of the ownership belongs to a bloke who is a crook and served time, and the local council wlays told us that the land could only ever be used for recreational use, but we all know these things are just blocked by the size of the brown envelope.

The owner also had a run in with the big speedway governing bodies, so that cant be good.

None of us believe the owner when he says he will find another venue, they all say that, and lets face it trying to get permission to build something like this now would be nigh on impossible.

So, we have 3 years, the last of which is a Coventry promoted andhosted world final which will make them a tidy sum, then who knows what for dogs, speedway and stock cars.

I can imagine speedway and dogs possibly getting a smaller, pint sized venue, but nothing like there is now.

[leonidas]

I suppose they could move to the Ricoh Arena - not much going on there now! Seriously though, Coventry always seems to get bodies through the door so there must be a market for a new venue. If Leicester speedway can do it, Coventry can...

In answer to the original question there is still plenty of rallying on during the winter months but apart from Brands it doesn't get the crowds. Rallycross has been trying to restart winter meetings but the February meeting was washed out due to the floods.