F.I.M gala

I am back in Finland from Estoril, Portugal where F.I.M. had 2010 prize giving gala for it’s World Champions. All F.I.M. Champions from different disciplines were presented gold medals at the casino of Estoril where we all had also dinner together and the show was live on TV. Friday afternoon we had a press conference. F.I.M. had thought of everything by putting me there between Toni Bou and Tomasz Gollob. Me and Tomasz both had our 20th anniversary in our sports and on the other hand Toni Bou has won four consecutive world titles in Trial just like I have done in Enduro! In the evening red carpet, tuxedos, evening dresses and cava were the name of the game. For the dinner and the gala I was seated at the same table together with E3 Champion David Knight on my left but other riders of my table were track racers. Next to me on my right was Ice Speedway World Champion Nikolai Krasnikov from Russia, next to him Long Track World Champion Joonas Kylmäkorpi from Finland, next to him Speedway Junior World Champion Darcy Ward from Australia then Speedway World Champion Tomasz Gollob from Poland and Track Racing legend Ivan Mauger from England. I learned that Nikolai the Ice Speedway Champion won his 6th World Title in a row! That’s insane like the sport his doing. Check out this video from his racing to see what I mean! That kind of phenomenal performance deserves a lot more publicity than it gets. He must be a hero in his home city of Ufa in Russia some 2000km east of Finland but how many people outside Speedway world know about him? Road Racing and MotoGP more precisely is the discipline that gets the most media coverage and Jorge Lorenzo as a MotoGP champion a huge star so you would expect him to get chosen as a motorcyclist personality of a year at the F.I.M. gala. This nomination was decided by the people’s votes in internet. Everybody in the world with internet connection had a chance to vote. And the personality of the year was… Tomasz Gollob from Poland!!! Joonas told me about him and Speedway as a sport in Poland. He says Speedway is one of the most popular sports in Poland and in fact Speedway gets higher average attendances in Poland than any other sport so Tomasz Gollob is a well known personality all around Poland. There has been Polish Speedway World Champion only once before Tomasz back in 1973 so it was a big deal when Tomasz who has been after it for 20 years also himself finally won it! Everybody knows him in this country of 38 million people and everybody with internet must have voted. He is 39 years old and in his 20 years of Speedway he’s been close win the title but also had many injuries and once been hospitalized for almost a year so that kind of determination deserves to get rewarded! Check out a video from Tomasz's racing! Speedway was really the sport of the evening as Darcy Ward the Speedway Junior World Champion got the Rookie of the Year Award! After the gala we moved to the night club where cava was served and it was great to get to know these Speedway champions. Actually Joonas Kylmäkorpi is Long Track champion which is slightly different sport to Speedway. The tracks are longer and the speeds therefore higher and the bikes have a two-speed gearboxes and some tracks are on grass. Here’s a video of Joonas’s racing. It's the first time ever that Finnish rider wins World Title in Long Track! Here's also more photos and story about the gala at the F.I.M site.

If Nikolai from Russia had come a long way from his home to this gala so had Rocky Robinson from USA. He is the F.I.M. speed record holder. He has this rocket-looking bike of his that is capable of a speed of over 400mph! His machine is powered by two turbo charged Hayabusa engines and he tells so far he has run them on regular race fuel and haven’t needed nitro yet. I don’ know how they test these things safety wise? Flat tires or something starting to fall apart in such high speeds sounds terrifying! This summer Rocky set a new speed record of 376.363mp/h = 605km/h. Check out this video of his bullet ride!

Before the gala I had time to visit Lisbon with Marika on Thursday. First we took a train from Estoril to Lisbon, then we took a tram ride through the small hilly streets of old town. It felt like going back in time traveling with this ancient restored tram listening to Fado music from the earphones and looking out the window to this centuries old city. We had a wonderful lunch in beautiful Porta Do Sol district and walked around like tourists do: taking pictures. It was a nice to be in Portugal for something else than racing for a change!