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| After All This Time
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I was devastated when the TT was cancelled this year
and I reacted bitterly by cancelling my own trip over
after a run of more than fifty years.
How could I face a June without the feeling of total
physical and mental release as I clamber onto the
jolly ferry in Liverpool.
How could I be made to miss seeing so many friends and
acquaintances coming from the four corners of the
planet after all those years.
Up to that very last minute we had all hoped that the
TT would be run as a part of the Annual Motorcycling
Festival which has now grown to fill the two weeks
following the May Bank Holiday.
A number of things happened after the TT last year
which may have swayed the decision-makers to cancel.
Not least was the death of Mr TT, Joey Dunlop who lost
his life not on the Mountain but at a small meeting in
Tallinn, Estonia----yet his loss showed that even the
gods are not invincible.
A good friend, Simon Beck, lost his life at the 33rd
and over the last few years there have been a number
of other high echelon fatalities which must have made
people think.
The Superbike racing conflicts with the TT and riders
who would have done the TT now take the prime
TV-covered events.
Polls made while people are on the Island shows a
disturbing trend towards the "we ain't here for the
TT", and with all the extra sideshows the TT tends to
have taken second place lately.
I hope that this is not what it's all about.
So perhaps it is a good time to use this year to
reappraise the TT.
I now know that I come to the TT purely for a
nostalgia kick, remembering those heady days in the
past.
My brain is full of facts from byegone races and every
recent year has become a pre-set routine.
I book as I leave and then count off the days until I
again set out for the ferry.
My homestay is always there ready for me and my
friends know exactly where to find me on nearly every
day and night whilst I am on the Island.
Holiday !!--That's a joke-with all the early mornings
and late nights I need a holiday when I get home !!
This year, those people who will still be making the
effort to go will be worth interviewing post-festival
to see if the Island can run the piss-up in the
brewery.
It is what this group of people (are they really TT
fans ?) have seen and done that will steer the
decisions for 2002.
However, I am acutely worried that the TT course will
be the open-to-all race track which we all dread, for
this year there won't be the straw bales normally laid
on certain parts of the course.
People will want to ride the course as usual but at
least the racing brought in the bale protection of
wall edges and fencing.
I dread to think of people just riding round and round
just for the fun of it with a "the TT is off--we will
be the TT" mentality.
I may be wrong, (I hope I am) but this could be our
worst nightmare.
Ah well, I am planning TT 2002 already and thinking
very positively.
I hope you are all thinking positively too.
Ian Huntly
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