The Wanganui Cemetery Circuit Event Is One of the World's Great Road Races, and It's Right on Our Doorstep

RACING FEATURE >> WANGANUI CEMETERY CIRCUIT << The start of the F1 Superbike race was a clean but frantic affair THE SOU STORY RENNIE SCAYSBROOK PHOTOGRAPHY theDALLAS ALEXANDER RN The Classic Sidecars offered plenty of entertainment for the huge crowd on hand… The keenest punters spend the night before in the cemetary to ensure a good spot! … and the Cemetary circuit promo girls kept the boys in the crowd happy It looks like he’s winning, but Rennie is actually in fifth place on lap three of the second F2 600cc race Glenn Haden stole a surprise victory from Toby Summers in SuperMotard The Wanganui Cemetery Circuit event is one of the world’s great road races, and it’s right on our doorstep et me take you to a land not so Upwards of 12,000 screaming Kiwis line with the first race in 1951 taking place far away. A land that allows a the edges of the track, itself a 1.6km dash just two years after the start of the World different form of racing to what that takes around the 50sec mark if you’re Motorcycle Championship. you and I are used to. A land that really on it, and takes in Taupo Quay, railway For road racing purists, this is as close isn’t restrained by the insurance- crossings and manhole covers, as well as as you will get to races like the Isle of strangling suits that say the section where the event gets its name Man TT and North West 200 outside of the Lsomething this outrageous simply cannot be from, the cemetery. United Kingdom. Indeed this event has been done. This is Wanganui, New Zealand. And The marvellous Heads Road Cemetery described as the Isle of Man of the Southern this, my friends, is motorcycle racing at which sits inside the circuit grounds is Hemisphere, and it’s attracted almost as its best. one of the oldest European burial grounds many international stars to its start line The Wanganui Cemetery Circuit races in New Zealand, with the first recorded over the last 59 years (see breakout). are arguably the jewel in the crown of the burial taking place on 25 November, The Cemetery Circuit event is part of the New Zealand motorcycle racing season. 1843. Exquisite tombstones and grave three-round championship known as the Held every year for 59 years on Boxing Day craftings, some well over 150-years old, New Zealand Tri-Series, which also takes in (bar one – the first race being held on 27 dot the landscape between Heads Road and Hampdon Downs near Auckland for round December), the event takes over the sleepy Ridgeway St and provide one of the most one and Manfield Park at Fielding for round town of Wanganui, about an hour’s drive unique backdrops for racing anywhere in two, about 45 minutes south of Wanganui. north-west of Palmerston North at the the world. This is one of the world’s oldest Prior to this, for a period it was part of the lower end of New Zealand’s North Island. continual motorcycle races of any discipline, annual Battle of the Streets with the Paeroa amcn /56 57/amcn The 12,000 eager fans at Wanganui make the most of every vantage point RACE FACE There’s something raw and intense 1 about participating in an event that by all rights shouldn’t be possible in this insurance-strangled day and age. The chance to have a crack at the 2 Wanganui event came after a meeting with Suzuki NZ head honcho Simon Meade at the 2011 GSX-R600 and 750 launch at Hidden Valley (NT). After mentioning in passing that I’d be keen to do the event, Simon quickly Renoir gets away well at the start of the The start of second F2 600cc race with AMCN’s Rhys Holmes took five from six BEARS offered a ride on a 2011 GSX-R600 in F2. Needless to first F2 600cc race Rennie (far left) staying clear of the pack victories aboard the BMW say I jumped at the chance. n THE TRACK 10 TRACK STATS circuit near Auckland, but split from its charge in terms of the circuit construction, cemented the races as one of New Zealand’s The Wanagnui Cemetery Circuit is 1.6km long, and a 8 9 street cousin to join the the Tri-Series. the overhead bridge in the cemetery, and all great sporting events, with crowds growing good race lap on a 600 here takes about 52 seconds. 3 Track length: 1.6km The Tri-Series is run and promoted by the fences to keep the crowds safe.” year on year. The significance of this is not It’s physically demanding – stop/start, full gas/full First race: 1951 Wanganui local Allan Willacy, this being his Willacy is in the unique position of being lost on the local economy, with the annual brakes/full gas. Turns one on Ridgeway St and two down First winner: Dene Hollier first year in the top job alongside Cemetery the custodian of the land while the racing motorcycle spectacular now the biggest Wilson St are slow speed, second gear right-angle 6 Most wins: Ginger Molloy (14) Circuit Clerk of the Course Perry Lett and is in place. Effectively, the council signs the single earner for the city. right-hand corners, with turn two sporting a manhole 7 5 4 Director Mick Paul. Willacy notes that track over to him and it becomes his land. “The event costs us around $NZ200,000 cover on the inside. There’s only one place on the despite the Tri-Series being a three round “It becomes my property,” Willacy says. ($150,000) to put on, but with all the people track where you can rest, down the back straight out championship, Wanganui takes up “99 “It sounds funny but I have to give the cops coming here and spending money, it ends of turn two of Taupo Quay, and even then you only get percent of my time”. permission to come onto the premise and up pumping around $NZ1.4m ($1.07m) over a one-second breather. Then it’s into the fast right/left over the majority of the course made line selection “To make this event happen is a massive police it. Private property owners sign over the two days into the local economy,” Willacy flick over the train lines of Heads Rd, past the pits and critical, and I eventually tucked into a duel with Honda undertaking,” Willacy says matter-of-factly. a document to us that that states we can says. “It’s by far the town’s biggest sporting into the cemetery for another quick right/left flip-flop. rider John Oliver and the Yamaha-mounted Rhys “It takes about a week to get the track set-up go onto their property and evict people if event, and the local community really gets The entry is blind, heavily cambered and shadowed Holmes. My good parts of the track were the fast entry – it’s a lot of work to do in a week but it can there are any problems, which can happen behind the race as it’s been here for so long by trees – taken in third gear – and you need to nail over the train lines and into and through the cemetery only take a week because we can’t block the occasionally but most of the time people are and is so important to them. the exit here to get the run up Heads Rd to Robert – I’d pull a bit back on Oliver through here, but he roads off. We’re fortunate that a number of pretty responsible.” “We see the race now as a similar thing Holden Corner, which is the first of two consecutive had me across the final two corners leading onto the local businesses offer their services free of The event’s long 59-year history has to the culture that fits around horse racing,” second gear, right-angle, right-hand corners. Exiting straight, plus he was a lot faster (and braver) across Robert Holden Corner up Guyton St, you peel right into the cement dust strewn all across turn two. Rennie holds off Rhys Holmes to take Ridgeway St once again and accelerate up to the final Eventually I settled for seventh – I couldn’t quite sixth in the second F2 600cc race corner – an off-camber, third-gear left hander and keep the pace of the two in front of me, but I managed TTThe event costs $150,000 to put on but pumps around down the straight that cambers right off down the hill to keep Triumph rider Jamie Galway behind in eighth. as you click to fourth for a split second over the start n and finish line, before braking hard for turn one. n ROBERT HOLDEN MEMORIAL RACE RACE 2 $1.07m over two days into the local economy I only had one race left in F2 600cc, and it was reduced It’s an intense lap; a corridor of Kiwis, all screaming I had no idea that I had qualified for the Robert Holden from eight laps to six as the organisers were rapidly as you whiz by close enough for them to touch you. Memorial feature race, which is for the fastest 30 riders across all the classes bar Supermotard. Five running out of time to get the program finished. I was n THE BIKE minutes before the green light Simon from Suzuki determined to make this one count – I wouldn’t say it My ride for the races would be a bog-stock 2011 Suzuki NZ came rushing into the pits to tell me to get in my was win or crash, but I was hoping to crack a top six, GSX-R600, save for the race bodywork and Yoshimura leathers and on the grid! The 10-lap Robert Holden maybe even a top five result.

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