We are delighted to be joined by Andy Hayes, Director of Olivers Mount Racing, to find out the latest news from England’s only road race venue.
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click buy deliver with remote purchasing from the twotime motorcycle news dealer of the year Colchester Kawazaki proud sponsors of Chasing the Racing 3 2 1 and welcome back to Chasing the Racing episode 109 and we’re actually at a go-karting track northeast at the moment and we’re driving is that a shameless plug or we actually get that one no sponsorship but big uh big welcome to the podcast andy Hayes director of racing at Scarra director of Scarra director of Oliver’s Mount Racing co-director with Wendy of course co-director with Wendy Hayes yes and may I just say congratulations on obviously the KTM Red Bull ride there when did that come about well corporate sellout if I did it’s it’s just to try and get on their DAR team one day oh there we go then there we go i think we should jump straight into it you’re a bit of a DAR man then uh I I like the um I like the rallying so yeah that’s my my passion nowadays so I just got back from a not too successful trip to Greece for the uh the Helis rally the Helis right yeah which is uh that’s gone straight over our heads there helis is Greek for Greece I think right so it’s just the first round of the European Championship so there we go are you doing the full European uh no I’m not cuz I’ve got this thing called Oliver’s Mount to concentrate on instead but but yeah I would like to if it wasn’t for that yeah yeah yeah I was about to say cuz a lot of people be tuning in to see what actually has happened this season and how it all turned into what it was when it actually got shut down and the whole story building into that but here we go go on Chris yeah can I just jump in just so obviously we’ll get talking about the recent news all as Dom’s just alluded to but we’ve actually got a breaking news by the time this podcast goes out it’ll be uh the just after the first round of the British bike in Open Park so it won’t be news then but the news is actually that we’ve got a new a new member of the BSB paddic we’ve got a new hair gel wanker and uh to welcome to the welcome to the BSB club i bought him a BSB starter pack so oh my god here I have so if you’re watching this on YouTube we’ve got you your sunglasses actually good quality glasses yeah you got straight from little middle of you ever been in the middle of little i have yeah we’ve got your We’ve got you your hair gel oh my god we’ve got I’m chewing me words here now aren’t I son we’ve got your teeth whitening we’ve got your your moisturizer know when your skin gets a little bit dry so I’m a bloke little bit of fake tan in there as well shut up man you need this from your sister we’ve got some comped for when you get blisters you know on your hands and your ankles so you need you definitely need to them to look after we’ve got some sharpies for signing the autographs for the fans and finally we’ve got a we’ve got a book for you to write your feelings in so if you’re feeling a bit low that’s a soy the only thing you didn’t get is it so you know what that is don’t you i think you’re going to say talent yeah damn right it’s talent is it Is there any talent in the bottom of that bag cuz you see any Andy cuz there’s nothing in there so I’m I’m just wondering how you’re going to show your face in a road race paddock again after this it’s No it’s I’m I’m just hoping it opens up with open arms and I’ll get back to Oliver’s mouth but no I’m definitely getting chucked in the deep end [ __ ] the armbands clean off and just head first just a quick message on that so so you’re doing the first round super sport and it’s with the count racing team on the same bike as what you’ve been riding at Olives Mountain and stuff yeah well obviously this came about from I was about to say everything’s going to go around what we’re going to discuss later on but it came about because um Olives Mountain has obviously hit some difficulties yeah and we’ve actually stepped into the British paddics solely because it was a it fell at the right spot now don’t get me wrong there were other club meetings and stuff but we sat down as a team and went I tell you what let’s face it if you’re going to go fast it it is at British you know you’re talking the cream of the crop it is at the top there you are that’s a t-shirt right there let’s get that sold that’s the next merchandise straight off the top um so but like yeah I’m very realistic you know this is way we’re talking backwards now so it’s already being happened while it’s going but um if I win I’m over the moon which ain’t gonna happen by the time this goes out your bike could be in a thousand pieces oh don’t be saying that man don’t be saying that cuz Fran it’s not my bike it’s Fran’s man oh do you have like going going into the I know you’ve done a few wild cards before basically but have you got any sort of realistic ambitions for the weekend or you just not thinking about it i’ve got no real N i haven’t got any am like No that’s the thing i just You know what the worst thing is Chissy i’m just going to see how it is i’m just scared of making a bigger dick out myself than I normally do you know what I mean i’m I’m more uncomfortable sitting on a microphone and making a fool of myself you know that is that that’s more of a you know more of a duck’s back but when you when you’re passionate about it we’re all passionate people especially don’t have to tell you you’re on a race circ but it it’s it’s it’s hard you know that’s the truth you know and people you know you can just get called [ __ ] and you’re useless and that but I’m not scared of failure i’m not scared of failure cuz you can only learn from there and I’m fully aware that I’m I’m going to be at the back i know that and I’m I’m going to learn and if I don’t go there and learn I really am wasting everyone’s time and money and I I can’t wait to get going that is a cracking excuse for people guide he’s already he’s already underlined it that is sh but let let me just say I think you’re doing absolutely the right thing i think um I think national level racing is just absolutely the best thing to to sharpen you up and bring you on and develop those skills you look at so many people that have achieved great things on bikes and they’ve pretty much all come from national level racing haven’t they so I think I think absolutely you’re doing the right thing that’s it but like like it’s the the cost thing that’s going to probably stop us doing it in the future but that that’s it’s the game it’s the rules we have to abide don’t they you know the control fuel the control tires and everything like that i’ll tell you what it’s yet again we’re going past have you seen the tire regulation thing we’re having to run 190s and yet stock lads are having to run 180s do you know anything about this 190 well you it’ll be straight over your head won’t it yeah I know we’ve we’ve had a change of tires so um Eddie Roberts at Complogs had the the tire supplier he’s been the official tire supplier for BSB for years and um he that’s all changed now so Complog have been replaced by I think is it ProTire I think they’re called or something like that and uh with that change there’s been a few changes so like super stock tires have went from being I think they’ve went from 55s to 60 so they sort of the it’s lifted the bike a little bit off the ground and I think super sports had a small change but doesn’t it hasn’t seemed to affect the time as much in in testing either positively or negatively of being kind of where you would expect them so I don’t think there’ll be that much in it to be honest fast as fast but I tell you what that that was going to lead into that perfect little question of like how did you get to meet Eddie but I think we I think people need to know who who you are and how you got into racing motorcycles period okay um so I was I was thinking about this on the way up because I knew you were going to ask this it’s called an interview i did what you know so many so many times I listen to your podcast all the time and so many times you you interview lads and they say “Oh well I went see Careers Adviser and they said I should do this said I should do that i never make any think myself racing motorbikes and I proved them wrong.” Well I did what they told me i basically stayed on did A levels went to university got the proper job and everything but by the time I could afford to go racing I was like 35 so I didn’t start racing till I was 35 i did a couple of years with NG Road Racing fantastic club loved uh loved that to bees really really enjoyed it um and I got to the point where I won a kind of minor championship with them and I knew that if I was going to push on and try and win say uh say the Club 600 championship that I’d have to get far more serious and put far more into it and I just didn’t really have the time or money to do that so I quit racing built my own house for a few years and then I went to Right and then in with all this money I’ve saved I’m going to build a house you I don’t want to upset you Dom but if you quit racing you could probably build a house not a bloody hope son not a bloody hope build it out build it out of tree trunks oh god i I even need planner permission for that with the bloody wet wipes in the council um so in 2015 I went to watch uh my good friends uh Steve and Matty Ramden do side cars in the TT and I watched the whole TT it was the first TT I’d ever been to and I thought I want to do this so I decided to take up racing again which got me destroyed the house yeah destroyed the I to be honest I’ve never finished the house and since I started racing I told Wendy it’s on hold now so I haven’t even finished it how many how many years is this life well it was well it was 2016 that I started racing again so I haven’t touched it since then oh god and you’re still married just about oh there you are we listen to this going that’s you know they brought up a good point there you know like yeah when is this house getting done don’t don’t remind her so um so 2016 Spring Cup I found myself on the grid at Scarra and uh as you know Scarra is one of them places you either love or hate it and I loved it just loved it from the outset and so I raced quite a lot at Scarra in 2016 2017 i got to do the Mans Grand Prix in 2017 did it again in 2018 and absolutely loved that to be honest i mean I don’t need to tell you racing around the aisle of man for me it’s the best thing I’ve ever done in my life and you could probably agree with that i’m sure 100% I’m very very biased in that situation i mean you know I know we can swear on here but I have to say I remember like you take that that left hand at Crosby flattening top absolutely stretching the cables and I just in my helmet I just thought this place is [ __ ] mental it really is isn’t it it’s just the best feeling ever um so but you know I got to the point there where I could either keep doing that and keep getting a couple of mile an hour faster a year and that kind of thing but I’ve got I’ve got this reputation for sort of crashing quite a lot as well now let let me clear this up we had no idea about that reputation for none of our listeners so would you like to tell us why you got this reputation well don’t say if I’m crashing don’t you dare say it crazy lee Johnston said to me “How can someone who who goes so slow crash so much?” You’re you’re a tryer yeah yeah i’m I’m a definite tryer and definitely I’d say ambition outweighs ability quite a few times so So I figured if that’s your mindset maybe the island man isn’t the place for you so So I figured cuz you know in 2017 it had a go at killing me and it had another go at 2018 oh so you’ve crashed on the island no I haven’t crashed but I should have done both times so so one time on lap two of the newcomers race my rear wheel bearing collapsed just coming out of Greeber Bridge so you know that wasn’t your fault well what was it i’m part of the mechanic team really at my level aren’t I so I think we I think we missed a spacer out the back wheel and that crushed the bearing so you know that you know how important bike prep is for for that place so 100% got around quarter bridge with a Well I did I did a full one lap with it like that so this was lap two so I’d already done 170 mph on it so I take that I take that as a as a you know a slice of luck large slice of luck a slice one of the nine lives yeah um so that was that was year one and then year two just I don’t know if you’ve ever done it you’re probably not as stupid as me but for for five seconds I can’t believe I’m saying that actually for 5 seconds have you ever had a brain fart where you forget where you are and that is not the place to do it but coming up to Balac Cry I forgot where I was and I just peeled in i drifted over to the left so I entered Balacry on the left hand side of the road and I’ve got it on video and I kind of shut off cuz I ain’t got a clue what’s going on and then all of a sudden I’ve got this big left hand corner i’m doing 130 mph i should have been doing 150 but I backed off and I ended up going wide on the exit but I tried to make the corner rather than [ __ ] myself and break i tried to make the corner ended up skimming along the hedge row my two tires were totally off the tarmac and I’m skimming along the hedro 130 mph and I just thought I’m down but next thing I know it’s dropped back down pegged down three gears down a down to quarry bends and was that enough for you to just think oh I think this might not be the best idea i I just think if you give if if you’ve had a near-death Well it’s wrong to say near-death experience but if you’ve had warnings two years on the trot you kind of don’t want to give it a third chance do you and sometimes you’ve got to quit while you’re ahead and you know I mean I was what 40 probably 46 years old and I’m thinking you know I’m not not going to win this thing i’m only doing it for the enjoyment of it plus I kept dragging my kids their summer holiday as every other kid’s summer holiday was just basically in a rainy caravan in a paddock in in Douglas for two weeks and you just think you know if I’m not here for any great purpose apart from having a bit of fun can I really spoil these kids these kids summer holidays for the rest of their their childhood it’s more like make them from your experience oh it is i I said that that’s the thing though is it you know like so was your your like speaking on that note that cuz he’s brought up do your parents race or anything like that or bikes or They hate motorbikes you’re not you’re not from a racing family no no but I’ve got two older brothers and they were both into bikes that’s why I got some kind of bike thing cuz when I was a kid I used to live in Gernzi and in Gernie one of the best name places in England just so we can say it out loud to people i’m from Gernzi yeah and in in Gernzi you can ride you can ride a 100cc bike on the road at the age of 14 piss off you can so no leg legally no I know this will be a new concept on but legally you can ride a bike on the road at so if we ask Siri right now and you have a word with yourself no way do it seriously even now even now even now i hope there’s a Gernzie listening right now going “Mom get the wheels out.” There was it was only when I was flying out to Greece the other day i happened to bump into a guy who lived in Gernzi and I said “Can 14 year olds still ride on the road?” He says “Yep they can.” So literally it’s still So is that your is that your only backup to this argument talking the No see so so what I’m saying when I when I lived in Gernie I was eight but my brother was So I lived there between the age of four and eight but my brother is 8 years older than me so he was 14 and he had a CB100N and I remember at the age of like six sat on this bike on the driveway just pretending to rev it and that’s what got me into bikes inspiration yeah but mom and dad never like bikes at all so I got no encouragement as a kid at all so now I’ve got a racetrack and 10 bikes in the garage just to just to race them off and a KTM contract i must be so proud of that now speaking of uh the track Oliver obviously when was it a few years ago when everything sort of looked well the future was very uncertain and just talk us through the story of like how how it was all rescue and the team okay so so just to finish off how I got into it so 2016 2017 I raced there i was racing at the Gold Cup in 2017 when the two bad accidents were i just finished the 600A final and then it was the 600B final that daily on the electric bike went through the fence so that was literally the race i I was really in the last race that finished at Oliver’s Mountain in fact I probably came last in that race as well so I was probably the last person to finish a race there now we all heard of that incident what What was the actual reason like I like I knew dearly unfortunately had an accident and the bike went into the Was it into the crowd it went straight on at Drury’s through the through the gate right there we are and then that caught like But what was there a natural outline reason why that happened then was it i haven’t read any official report into it but my my guess is that because these electric bikes weigh about quarter of a ton yes my guess is that by lap two I think it was cuz Dy knew that place like the back of his hand you know what I mean like the back of his hand i’m I’m fairly confident what will have happened is by lap two you know how heavy the braking is at Oliver’s Mount you know you’ve got three hair pins massive breaking three times a heap so I reckon at the end of Drury’s just had no breaks and then the incident happened after that that’s my guess right but I’ve seen nothing official on that yeah I’ve not I’ve not seen anything on that side of things but um so yeah so yeah you saw the incident and then where did we go from there okay so um so I I kind of got word in early 2018 that things were going a bit bit pear-shaped um with Auto 66 PMH Promotions so I got in touch with um with the council um to see if I could um if I could be a part of bringing it back literally just picked up the phone ran to the council office yeah picked up the phone and rang them um that didn’t get me very far to be honest i don’t know why can Can you remember how you opened that call um yeah hi it’s Andy H the Crasher oh that’s me i’m I’m ringing about safety all of us yeah no I I literally just um I think as as far as it got me is I ended up having a 10-minute conversation with somebody tried to sell them why I could do something there and obviously didn’t go too well and and ultimately they decided that Mick Grant and Eddie Roberts were the right pair um to to bring this back um and so so they were they were cracking on with that and um when I did the Mans I got a lot of help from Nick Jeff um you know in terms of learning the course and that kind of thing and Nick’s such a great guy nick been friends with uh Mick and Eddie and um initially part of that group that were bringing it back nick knew that I really wanted to be involved in that as well so he introduced me to Mick and Eddie we had a chat um and we agreed that I could be part of that that group and that actually came around that was probably around about January 2019 and so about a year after I’d first tried to get involved I actually then became part of Mick and Eddie’s group right oh no it’s just interesting how Mick and Eddie just seemed to like seem to have just appeared with this i was that like how did that actually come about did them two just have a chat and then just get in touch with the council themselves there’s there’s a whole backstory to that that fill this entire podcast and and some of it’s a little bit political as well so it’s probably best just left at the fact that they got involved yeah mick and the the council wanted MC the council thought Mick and Eddie were the right people to resurrect it yes mick and Eddie um decided that they wanted somebody young you know both both been in the 70s and and how quotes from Mick cuz he comes out with so many quotes mick and Eddie didn’t see it as a career move that’s straight from Mick um so they thought that it would be great to bring in somebody younger with enthusiasm that could take it forward into the future so so it was always the idea that I’d be if you like for a couple of years their apprentice that they’d get it up and running and then they’d hand it over because they you know I mean you know about the amount of hassle that’s going on at the moment they don’t want that they’ve they’ve done their work they’ve they’ve retired they want to enjoy the retirement and Mick loves his Trials Eddie loves his classics they’ve they’ve done what they had to do in terms of getting it resurrected again so like between all this though you’ve obviously you’ve got like a day job and everything like that so you can’t you don’t unfortunately so what do you do for a day when balancing a race track as well as a job i’ve got I’ve got a really exciting day job i’m a I’m an IT project manager in central government around about February 2020 i actually gave up my day job now if you think back in history that was a really bad time to give up a job that was probably the worst time in history to give up a job so I did actually give up my job um around about February 2020 so I could concentrate on uh getting more and more involved in Oliver’s Mount obviously this little thing called Corona virus popped up around about February March time so luckily I was able to go capping hand back to my boss in my day job and I got my job back so So I’m still doing that now and the reason I’m still doing that and it does make life really really difficult because effectively I’ve got two full-time jobs but I need I need to pay the bills and obviously the years the time that we’ve had at Oliver’s Mount there’s no way I can pay the bills from Oliver’s Mount you know it just has no spare cash whatsoever so so I think the best thing I can do for Oliver’s Mount is just work bloody hard have two full-time jobs and not take any any wage for Oliver’s Mount really and that’s it’s as simple as that and um obviously there’s been huge news recently with with Olives Mount um in terms of like you had four scheduled races this year yeah and the first one was it was a great event i came down myself and really enjoyed you know watching the race dom stayed on didn’t you stay on this time i stay on a lot more than you so I don’t know i’ve had to repair your fence which fence found Benz what was that last year yeah did you not go through the fence i did that was my fault that was that was 100% my life so you might forget but some you’d leave carnage behind and we have to clear it up mate that’s called my life m getting in the enjoyment side of it no yeah break failing that was a good one yeah funny we’re talking about breaks that was my fault but obviously it’s been massively in the news recently that there’s the well talk us through what’s happened like the ins and outs of it okay so yeah obviously Oliver’s Mount has had no look at all since that race in 2017 we just discussed so obviously what went on in 2018 I think was terrible um the way that people were were were were treated in 2018 by PH Auto 66 i Peter Hillby did an awful lot for lovers mount over the years but I think he really let himself down at the end and and how he treated people in 2018 was was disgraceful and then 2019 we obviously had to invest a lot of money up front we had to buy loads and loads of rectail you know you’ll see as you’re riding around there’s lots of lots of rectail now everywhere isn’t there and it’s it’s according to Gary Thompson it’s it’s the safest road race that he knows um and and that and and we’ve seen some accidents you know we’ve seen people go into the cafe we’ve seen people crash along the start finish straight and and you know get away relatively minorly i think without all that investment and that recctor I think some of them accidents would have been quite a lot worse to be honest so it’s it’s definitely paying off then 2020 obviously the pandemic we had a couple of events but we had restricted crowds we pretty much just kind of covered our costs in 2020 if if that so 2021 we had great hopes for this season we had four events booked in the Spring Cup went really well um we actually actually for the first time we saw the bank balance move in the right direction for a change and I thought my god we’ve we’ve actually turned the corner now um we can actually have three other great events um we can even get like an annual championship up and running as well cuz we’ve got four events so that was on the cards um and then it just out of the blue um the the council Scarabra Council decided that they had a duty to inspect their entire estate and and they probably do i don’t I don’t know the rules around it but I imagine they do have this duty and I think they’d maybe been a bit a bit lax in doing this for a while but they decided that now was the time they needed to do it so they brought in an external um surveyor who was going around every building in Scarra and when he got to Oliver’s Mount uh to be honest he was he was scared by what he saw um he pulled up he pulled up by one of the buildings and he ended up actually moving his car that’s how scared he was which building was that then that that was actually just at the back of the med center so uh you know that that little kind of layby parking area there um and so as the week went on in fact it was kind of over two weeks over the course of two weeks it went around building after building and the story just got worse and worse so we at 243 Racing we are road racing we had a number of meetings where we discussed the situation as more and more buildings were getting ticked off as as condemned and and needed demolishing we had plenty of meetings to discuss how we could carry on with the Barisheen because we’re only a couple of weeks away from the Barisheen so I had to say that that was that was the worst thing about this whole situation and sadly people read what they want to read in any situ like they can’t well you know people are getting feeling hard done by people are like this going what two weeks why the why haven’t you given two weeks absolutely um so we had we had plenty of plans in place and then we had more and more discussions with with the surveyor and more and more buildings had problems and it just it just got to the point where it just became absolutely unsustainable so for example if you can imagine around every building in the paddock they’ve now put a Harris fencing that’s probably I don’t know let’s say seven or eight mters away from a building so every building now has a seven or eight perimeter exclusion zone around it and then we started discussing things like the LPG tank that’s that’s next to the um next to the cafe building and we want they needed a 17 m exclusion zone around that if we were going to have a generator there had to be 3 meter exclusion around the generator plus a fuel tank so so I even said well okay we won’t have any power we’ll we’ll ask the teams to bring their own generators which wouldn’t be popular but it would have still worked and they said no you can’t you can’t do that because what you’re doing there is you’re increasing the fire risk um you cannot mitigate one risk of building collapse by increasing the fire risk to to mitigate it so I said “Right if you’re telling me lads can’t run tire warmers there’s no way they can have power for tire warmers the meeting’s going to have to be cancelled.” Because what you’ve done there is there’s a theoretical risk about the fire risk but there’s an a very real risk of sending people out on cold tires and and so it just became completely unsafe to to proceed so I I discussed with them about the timeline because what we’ve got to do now is we’ve got to demolish these buildings um so we can take the Harris fencing down and then we can claim that space back i discussed the timelines of how long it’s going to take us to do this and obviously it being the council I mean the council are doing everything they can to help us out but things in the council take time to achieve and and especially where there’s money to be spent as well so they couldn’t give me any assurance that all this would be done in the next 6 weeks prior to the festival meeting and in all honesty I couldn’t in good conscience sell tickets for an event I wasn’t confident of running and and you know the hardest part for me is when you hear tales of people that have booked feries booked hotels all that kind of thing you know it’s not just the 20 25 or 40 quid they’re paying for a ticket some people have spent £500 on on fairies hotels that kind of thing and we’ve been at the sharp end of people ringing up saying “I’m 500 quid down what are you going to do about it?” And it’s it’s heartbreaking so obviously you hope that hotelers uh that rely on this trade and that feries that rely on this trade you hope they’ll help people as much as they possibly can but when you know that’s the real cost of this happening you know you can’t in good conscience allow people to to go making these plans if you’re not 100% sure you’re going to run that meeting um so so we we I just had to take the call there and then that the festival wasn’t going to run either so is that the the next two are cancelled so we still got the the final one so we’ve got we’ve got the Gold Cup so the Gold Cup is scheduled for the 18th and 19th of September um that gives us basically what this in this meeting it was it was a council the surveyor and also the ACU as well i said to all parties I said we’ve really really got to concentrate on making sure we get the everything done so the Gold Cup can run in 3 months time and I’ve got to be honest and I laid this down to them as well but I said “If we don’t run the Gold Cup then the future of Oliver’s Mount is in doubt because we got the Spring Cup that went well that financially will see us through summer if we don’t run the Gold Cup I don’t know how we’re going to get through winter quite honestly but if we do have a go good cold cup and I’m firmly believe we will there will be money in the bank to see us through winter.” And what in terms of the buildings what’s the plans for like you collapsing the the cafe what else the the the cafe can probably be saved by demolishing the back of it so So there’s a there’s a wall at the back that apparently doesn’t have planning permission and should never have been built it’s not been built on decent footings at the back it’s on virtually a cliff it’s going to disappear down that cliff soon enough anyway so the idea with the cafe is we’re going to drop the back back wall um and and then basically we’re going to make that good all we will actually lose from doing that is the showers so the idea then is to bring in some portal cabins for showers we’re all tramps anyway you don’t need showers yeah you all smell no not not now not now Dom i know i’m I’m with the BSB party but I tell you what sorry for sorry for interrupting you so you know when you’re saying like we and that So you being the director of it those buildings belong to the council they do so is it the council who has to foot the bill for the repair who who’s what there’s so many I can see hurdles here you know what I mean yeah so that that is that is a a topic of debate right now as you can imagine so legally um in in a commercial lease it’s quite common that the tenant has responsibility for the building in terms of maintenance which would be the council in this situation no I’m the sorry I’m the tenant so the council would have a very strong legal argument say that I’m responsible for it but I would have a strong argument say that actually these are in you know these buildings were delinquent two years ago when the lease started i don’t really want to go into this too much because the council are being tremendously supportive and and and we haven’t had that discussion where we’re both pointing the finger at each other basically what we’ve said is the only way we’re going to get through this and save all mount is by each of us doing as much as we possibly can and that’s where we are with the council i’ve I’ve obviously seen things online a lot of people blame the council a lot of people think that the council want to actually see racing finishing at Oliver’s Mount and this is their way of kind of forcing that that’s completely untrue um Scarra Council know how much money it brings into the economy locally they’re tremendously supportive of it and they are they are going beyond what they are legally required to do and they are being very supportive so I think where we don’t know where we’re going to get to with it quite yet but it’s there will be a degree of shared responsibility and and they will help wi with with and and and certainly in terms of professional advice they’re helping massively at the moment because so much of this is outside of our skill set and experience but they’ve got the they’ve got the resources to get the right people on board to help and make sure that it’s all done in the right way so so so they will help so just to finish off that there’s quite a few buildings that that will be demolished within I would hope four weeks so we’ll flatten those buildings if we can within that time scale um and then for the Gold Cup we’ll be looking to get some some porter cabins in just to run that Gold Cup meeting and then as funds allow um we’ll be replacing the buildings but even for example the iconic control tower that probably has about 18 months left to live and then that will have to get replaced as well right in two or three years I think the only buildings that are in the paddock now that you’ll see in two or three years time are the Irish bar which surprisingly is the only building with a complete clean bill of health um class it’s a Have you seen the Irish bar it’s a little it’s a little wooden hut that pretty much a god built you know what I mean so it’s like many a tail have been spun an air sun it’s it’s even had Michael Dunlop in it doing a burnout in his bike but apparently that’s good for buildings and that way that’s it the rubber the smell the lot the atmosphere it’s got to live so uh and and probably the the cafe and toilet and rider office block that will probably survive as well but probably every like that big scrutiny bay that will definitely be gone with very soon um there’s the buildings are so old and run down and and pretty much a health hazard there’s there’s nothing really worth saving and the worry for me is I mean it’d be great to start off with new buildings clean bill of health it’ll set us up for the next 25 years the worry for me is that we lose some of that character and that that worries me slightly but I think at the end of the day we need to move on and the spring cup at the beginning of the year was that limited to 4,000 yeah it was yeah yeah and uh were you was it a case of it was sold out quite early and would you expect without the restrictions if there would have been many more there or is that about where you’re looking at no no because it didn’t actually sell out oh so um yeah no it didn’t so so I I can tell you now that we had about 2 and a half thousand there on Saturday and about 3 and a half thousand on Sunday so we never actually sold the 4,000 now it’s a bit of a shock m it is it is just cuz more people just think oh where they’ll be gone won’t you know people just assumed rather than anything yeah but I I wonder and and I’m hoping that that is because people are still wary of coming out or because I think at Scarra as well a lot of people love to look at look at the what the weather’s doing and come on the day and just pay on the day and we’re not allowed to accept that we can only accept payment in advance at the moment and that if you look traditionally at how people pay when they come to Oliver’s mound it’s it’s the vast majority are on the day in cash and we just we haven’t allowed that for two years now and and that is purely because of corona virus as soon as restrictions are gone cash is key well we just want everyone to come back don’t we yeah definitely um because what I have said the the best way people can support all of us mount is to come to the races uh absolutely if people come to the races pay their entry it’s like you know any road racing in Ireland or wherever we all need we’re very much at a crossroads right now and we all need people to come and support us and if you don’t come and support us it won’t survive and that goes for Ireland Southern 100 Oliver’s Mount we need people back through the gates i do think that in the past I think we priced people out of it a little bit and I’m trying really really hard to keep prices as low as we possibly can because I’d much rather lots of people come and pay a bit than a few people come and pay a lot and and that’s why as well kids under 16 are free and and I’d like to think they always will be free because we’ve got to get that next generation into it and I don’t want to make it difficult for families i want to make it easy for families to come no I totally agree i tell you what though there’s something that I keep mentioning you do listen to the pod and you’ve probably heard me say it it’s like on a total personal note now just take away the the [ __ ] stick that you’ve been beaten half to death with now what’s happened is with the clash dates you know now that is not just like Scarra and the road racing it’s been the BSB and clubs it’s a it’s another compact year for the whole of the sport but with your misfortune it’s actually freed up road racing a little bit more now now Bill Kennedy at the moment at this precise moment he’s only allowed 500 spectators and in his own his own words it’s not feasible to run if they only allowed 500 spectators i can I can completely believe that because in my early discussions around the Spring Cup it was suggested that we’d run with 2,000 and and I just said we can’t we we we will just lose money and we are not in a position at the moment to lose money um so I pretty much refuse to run it with 2,000 yeah no no we totally understand that you need you need people there you need to keep the sport alive but like you see like hopefully armory goes cuz the thing it’s it’s one collective pot isn’t it road racing you know we’re insul cuz the fact is you get one crack a year bar Oliver mount you get four cracks a year and it was my my little my little pet peeve that two it was it really was and it was like two absolutely amazing vents clash you know it’s a bit like so on a um got to ask you while you’re sitting in front of me what what’s the plan there for the future as far as potentially stopping that so I mean let me say you know you’ll appreciate this year and last year absolute nightmares for trying to program events because everybody’s moving around left right and center bsb have run such compact seasons because they’ve had to for the last two years and BSB are the main show you know BSB will do what BSB want to do they probably only take notice of World Superbikes and and Moto GP aside from that they probably do whatever they want and the rest of us wait for the BSB calendar to come out and then we all try and do our calendar i remember when we set this year’s dates i remember looking at the various conflicting things cuz you know I’ve got to miss I wrote down this list of things I’ve got to miss the other day i’ve got to miss TT and and bearing in mind at the time we set the dates last year we didn’t know if TT was a runner or not we’ve got to run we’ve got to miss TT we got to miss Classic TT Mans Grand Prix Sidecar Racing Association you know FSR where they have their championship because I don’t want to pull away from them and they don’t want to pull away from our cuz it’s basically the same sidecar outfits at both yes uh we’ve got to miss BSB we’ve got to miss anything going on in Scarra like um you know um the various armed forces days that they have and that kind of thing um so there’s there’s a whole raft of things we’ve got to miss and by the time you take everything out you’ve got to miss you’re probably left with probably not even four weekends left so you’ve got to clash with something and I remember thinking last last year I remember thinking we’re going to clash with Armoy and I thought who’s going to cut us Scabra and Amoy now I know it’s Dom Herbertson but at the time if I could I tell you I tell you what if if we could we would you know what I mean yeah yeah um but I’ve I’ve at the time I didn’t I didn’t know Bill Kennedy from Amoy yeah but but I do now we’ve had some good conversations and I’m now completely understanding that Amo is a race that we don’t want to clash with and going beyond that what we all want to do is we all want to look at setting up some kind of championship right a proper road race championship and if that’s the case you know you know we want to be working with with with some of these other race organizers and circuits to get a meaningful properly sponsored hopefully televised championship that gives people a reason to go to these events and and and I think it’ll really pull the fans in to look at a year-long championship in you know Ireland England that kind of thing um is man um so I think I think there’s a lot we could do there so that means that if we do get that off the ground and and I spoke to Bill about this and I know that he’s he’s quite keen to do something on this if we get that off the ground then obviously the first thing we’re not going to clash with is anything like Armoy or Southern 100 or something like that because we all want to be part of a of a joint championship um so so yeah I don’t think that’ll be happening again no no like you say if it does it’s it’s good because people listen to this and like you say people only get one side of the story can it it’s good to hear like our listeners will be able to hear this and going well well hell man you’re trying and obviously you’re trying but it’s nice to come from the the horses man speaking of the TET element obviously uh you’ve had the ITV coverage with Steve Parish hosting it and I’ve watched a few of them really you know good coverage and uh also the there was another totally different setup for I believe it was Apple TV the whole Rich Energy like sponsored by Rich Energy and that’s been released in like little little 10-minute sort of bites on on YouTube which I’ve been really enjoying uh the like Dave Neil does the the voice over at the beginning shout out little shout out to it mr podcast and yeah really good but it’s it the more the more sort of media and sort of it’s just making it that bit more professional bringing other people in and is what’s the plan with that whole Apple TV thing um so the it’s a difficult one that because the whole thing with with TV I’ve got to be completely honest here i love it being on TV on ITV and Euro Sport i love that but I’m going to be totally honest it’s very expensive for us it costs us a lot of money to be on ITV and Euro Sport and as things are as they are at the moment we cannot afford it so it’s it’s something that is very much at risk right now you know if I’m you you might well be aware that some people are offering financial help to all of us mount right now some people are putting their own money in to actually help us recover from this really bad situation now I’m not going to go into figures but we are expected to pay quite a lot of money per weekend to have that filming done that goes on ITV and Eurosport and I can’t I can’t it was difficult for me to even accept anybody putting you know fans putting any kind of money in um but in the end I decided it’s probably best for all of us mount if we do allow that to happen because it means that we can recover so much faster but I don’t feel good about paying the amounts of money required to get it on ITV and and and Eurosport when people are actually putting their ad money into the club and into the facilities and the and ultimately the people who are going to be paying for this to go out on TV are the people who are coming through the gate to actually watch it so it’s the spectators paying to to watch that are actually footing the bill for people at home to watch it now I guess the idea is if we had corporate sponsorship that could cover all that that’s great and that’s a win-win for everybody but we haven’t got it we have not got the corporate sponsorship to the level that that we could just at least cover the cost of the TV so for the time being given we’re in such financial constraint at the moment and and you know we are fighting for the future of all all of us man I think it’s more important that we put that money into facilities and keeping ticket prices as low as we can rather than just the kind of almost vanity if you like have been on TV mhm um and and but the Apple TV is is is a different thing because with the with the YouTube stuff that Dave Neil’s and I have to say you know Rich Energy um do have Dave Neil on board but Dave doesn’t actually charge me for doing those voiceovers um if he gets paid by Rich Energy I don’t know but as far as I’m aware as far as I’m concerned Dave’s doing that for nothing uh which is which is really good of Dave rich Energy as we’ve got a fridge full there you know they they seem really keen to help out and and they have some sort of deal with Apple TV and they said that they would give us exposure on Apple TV just to help get Oliver’s Mount Man out there and I think as as well I think the future is is a lot more to do with things like YouTube um than just broadcast TV um and and so I think that probably is quite a bit of the future but having said all that if we can get this club if we can get this road race championship going I’d love it to be televised i’d love it to be on ITV4 and I’d love it to be on Eurosport but but the whole financial side of it has to change a bit because we simply do not have the money to pay the the the amounts that have been asked and and it’s as simple as that and I just don’t think it’s right that the man coming through the gate with his family is actually paying his money that’s going to to the TV ultimately I think ITV4 and Eurosport need to at least pay the money to get the program made you know they sell the advertising it’s on Eurosport every week it follows BSB every week and it’s great it’s great exposure for us but why can’t the TV companies at least pay for the program to be made rather than expecting the clubs and circuits to pay for it yeah and it’s not just us it happens at Southern 100 the only place it doesn’t really happen is is Northern Ireland because PBC pay for that yes and and so I just just want people to be aware of what the finances are in this respect because it’s a real squeeze on on clubs and in my mind it’s just not right i think the TV company should be should be footing that bill we’ll have a few Patreon questions just quickly you mentioned about uh fans backing backing the club financially what’s the like for example if someone’s listening who would possibly be interested in doing that what’s the best way to get in touch with you okay so on on our Facebook page um Oliver’s Mount on Facebook um you can see that there is um there’s a PayPal QR code if they just scan that QR code with the phone um it’ll take them straight to to contribute into our our our uh fundraiser um aside from that as well there’s also some bank details on there what I wanted to avoid was I wanted to avoid quite a bit of it disappearing in in kind of you know like a a fundraising commission website sort of thing so I wanted to try and make it as as efficient as possible yes sir and also there were plenty of other people wanting to set one up but I was a bit worried if somebody set one up that was unofficial I was a bit worried that do you know where that money actually ends up going and that kind of thing so I thought if if we get one out that’s official at least everyone knows that is that is the route mhm first one is Mike Autton bad news that meeting has been has had to be uh cancelled but I’m secretly happy that the Gold Cup has been rescheduled to my birthday weekend hope hopefully a bigger grid now that it doesn’t clash with BS being the Irish roads is a bit of a bonus uh he said he’s getting paid at the end of the week maybe can put a bit in the PayPal so big thanks and he said PS I think we need Chasing the Racing fan area which I think is a great suggestion i’m 100% behind that as well and then the second one Tony Rules how do you see Scarra moving forward in the future given the limited access and the government’s seeming hatred of bikes and racing is there a possibility of a chairlift system up and down heart attack hill we’ll go with the second one yeah I I have joked about that on Facebook actually i’d like I’d like to buy a reconditioned sking chairlift from from a ski resort yeah that is a good idea try and get that in store i tell you you want to get them tuk tuks man from Bangkok and just have a couple of runs up and could do with something a few times knowing you’re following uh like people of a certain age or people of a certain size and it is a bit of a struggle getting up i tell you what I seen Dean when we was there he had two kids and a push pusher and something else and he carried the whole lot was it like standing ovation at the time you know that that right there is a difference between a road racer and a BSB racer no I’m talking about the fans not you know Dean DC Racing might sorry I thought you were talking about Dean Harrison actually i thought I thought cuz Oh no no so like Dean super dad there like you say had it like had everything under his arms and you climbed up the hill but um Oh yeah so is anything in terms of other than the the main things that we’ve talked about already about needing to get fixed is anything that you in particular want to make happen for the future of in terms of like the event itself i’ve got loads and loads of plans to be honest so obviously a big thing is I want to get this road racing championship off the ground and and I’ve already had a lot of good discussions about that i’m confident something’s going to happen i just don’t know when because we all need to have a good solid season to do something like that yeah that sounds brilliant to be fair sounds class but what I’m also thinking I’m thinking about the future of Oliver’s Mount i mean I you know it’s 75 years old this year by the way in fact almost to the day of the Gold Cup it will be 75 years so we’re going to make a big thing of that but I’m I’m really really absolutely determined that it’s going to make a hundred years um so I I want to be here for the long term and I want the place to survive it’s not going to survive by just sitting back and doing what’s been done for the last 30 40 years it needs to innovate what we’ve got there we’ve you I mean you’ve both been there we have got a fantastic venue by the sea in a fantastic town we I think to survive need to diversify the road race Oliver’s Mount will always be about road racing there’s no reason why lovers mount can’t be a summerlong events venue um because it’s such a great location so I want to bring in rather than just try and take money off the same people so many times a year i want to try and attract other people to the event with different different events you know it could be it could be car shows it could be real ale shows it could be food and drink things it could be family music festivals anything like that so I want to really try and get that off the ground with the support of the council and really try and get that going another idea I’ve got to just bring another good revenue stream in is I would love to turn initially the paddock and then possibly the top field into a a car caravan site um when we’re not racing so you know if you look at the paddock okay it’s not great right now cuz it’s got a lot of Harris fencing up but once we get that down and we get some new buildings in there we’ll have tarmac power showers cafe all that kind of thing pretty much everything you’d need for a good family holiday really close to the town center really close to the bays i think a lot of people would like to actually come and spend a week in the Oliver’s Mount Paddock um so I think if you could get 20 30 caravans in there a night all paying to stay there this is all additional income that’s going to come in there and that means you don’t have to raise the prices for the races you don’t have to raise the prices for the fans you can increase you can improve the infrastructure and it’s just a big snowball it’ll just keep getting bigger and better camping Caravan Club like Jay from Inet Between Weekend in Campasan yeah yeah that that’ll be it yeah there we go i tell I think I think one of my final questions before we wrap up and get Brad in um is definitely who do you want to race on there um Chrissy right no no is that Yeah no I I I would I I would love I would love to see more um so for some reason a lot of a lot of Yeah yeah maybe we could get some sponsorship from from hair hair gel providers um now I would love to see you more BSB riders you know they are making the transition to roads but for some reason they seem to pick the Northwest 200 to do it more than anywhere why not Scarra it’s you know it it’s in the same country it’s I’ I’d love to see more people trying road racing at Scarra rather than just picking on the Northwest 200 for example yeah and use that as a stepping stone um and ultimately I think maybe where you’re going with that question is is where do I see um the kind of riders coming from olives Mount has to appeal to both the the committed Oliver’s Mount fan rider that loves the place and comes back time after time but it also needs to appeal um to the more professional rider as well of course it does and over time if you look through history it’s had some of the world great there you know I could rattle all the names off but you know them it’s the roll call is so so impressive we can’t let that go we have to concentrate on trying to make the best we can you know get the best riders there that we can without losing that kind of earthy road race feel as well so ultimately I want to attract the best i want to attract BSB riders yeah um but I also want to make it a place that your average road race rider that commits himself commits so much time effort and passion to it feels welcome to and and and that’s that’s that’s a difficult balance to achieve but I think we can and that’s what I like two little suggestions for me i think that what you’ve already mentioned about diversifying especially on race weekend if you could for example have like a really good live band on but like on the top field the second one I was just going to suggest is uh a little if there’s grandstand seating like you know like say where the bridge is or something if you could get a small little grand stand I think that would be that would be great but let me tell you as soon as you mentioned grandstand seating to insurance companies they it goes out the window they’re not keen they’re not keen so yeah we’d certainly look at that well um have you got anything else Tom no I to be honest I just I think um it’s great to actually sit here have a conversation where you hear from yourself and um mind you you did say before you got on this point you’ve got to mention your wife Wendy you’ve got to you’ve got to say thank you to Wendy well what what was running through my head is it’s more than just Wendy i need to really give some uh give give some credit to you know there are only four of us that that work full-time um at All of Us Mount Racing and and two of us have other jobs as well but basically the the the team the core team is myself my wife Wendy um and Haley and Sean hale and Sean’s been on this program before um the four of us are really the core team that try and run the whole thing and it’s um it’s an awful lot of work so I want to really give a big shout out to them but also you know the the place runs with so many volunteers as well all the 243 officials all the marshals people that volunteer help we’ve had so many offers of help in terms of building work and decorating and that kind of thing as well um and some individuals I won’t name them but some individuals that have actually put four figure sums of their own money in to see us recover and and if you think an individual for no benefit whatsoever they’ve dug put their hand in their own pocket with four figure sums coming in from one individual that’s that just takes my breath away to be honest so I really want to give a big thanks to them no brilliant absolutely brilliant and obviously very best of luck for your your Wait this is backwards again now so it’s already been out so busy good luck good luck for the weekend and looking forward to get started hold on hold on hold on sod mate good luck yourself you’re the defending champion you know what I mean i just quickly who do you fancy for BSB who do you fancy leading the BSB championship after this weekend um I would like to see Glenn Win i think he’s had some some nearly years and I think you know I’d like to think this could be his year what about yourself Dom oh god I have no idea like like we discuss this every time and it’s almost like another name gets thrown in the pot but there’s that many that that can push for the front that is such a diplomatic answer i think Glenn’s a great child great i think and can I give a shout out to my mate Lee for Super Sport as well yeah go for it i tell you what get it done this year Lee i tell you what how good would it be for Lee to win this championship it would be so so good wouldn’t it especially me being a very biased road racer you know what I mean just get him on the top that would be outstanding yeah that would be out but no hey excellent well we’ll get a podcast maybe at the weekend and we’ll see who we get on but before we go big thanks to our sponsor Colchester Kawazaki big thanks to our patronons and I tell you what we’ll do another competition big thanks to Andy of course for traveling up on this bike and um I just thought we’ll do a quick competition so win a jacket if you can’t put Blake’s jacket away comment on the YouTube video for a chance to win and I’ll put one of our caps so uh post a I’ve given all mine away to sponsors i’ve need to buy one myself actually i need to put your own hand in my pocket but yeah brilliant thanks very much and catch up soon cheers take care bye see you click buy deliver with remote purchasing from the twotime motorcycle news dealer of the year Colchester Kawazaki proud sponsors of Chasing the Racing