Motorsport: Court order takes fizz out of trans-tasman speedway meet

Australian Dene McAllen in action at Western Springs in the scaled-down meeting on Boxing Day. Picture / Fotopress

Nine more speedway meetings are scheduled for Western Springs Stadium between now and the first weekend of March, but promoter Dave Stewart says he does not want to run another like the one on Boxing Day.

The meeting was billed as possibly the last and most important speedway event at Western Springs, but fell flat because of fears noise limits would be breached.

Mr Stewart said yesterday that there were doubts whether the nine meetings, including seven international events, could be run at the stadium.

"We don't want to run another meeting like we did [on Sunday night]. It has really shown us exactly how many cars we can get on the track at any one time," he said.

The meeting turned into a nightmare as Mr Stewart tried to balance running competitive racing with the need to comply with Auckland City Council noise limits.

He was confident the noise limits were complied with after residents won an interim order from the Environment Court forcing compliance. The order was reinforced by the court last week.

But the first New Zealand versus Australia test race on Sunday night was stopped. The number of midget cars on the track was cut from eight to four - two cars from each country - but the encounter, according to Mr Stewart, "lost its fizz like a can of flat lemonade".

Powerful sprint cars which ordinarily can complete a 400m lap circuit in about 13 seconds were reduced to coasting around the track. Two of the cars were banned.

Only Kiwi Kidz races - for children aged from seven to 14, driving cars with a capacity of up to 200cc - regularly kept within the boundary noise limit.

Mr Stewart said the highlight of the night was the patience and good behaviour of the near-10,000.

A number of decisions would have to be made by the end of the week. Decisions included whether there should be another look at available legal options, the format and venue for the international speedway series due to start on January 15, a January meeting date for an event rained out on December 4 and what would happen to the next night's racing, on January 8.

"I would say it [the January 8 event] is extremely unlikely."