Tuesday’s news that the FIM Endurance World Championship will return to Spa Francorchamps in 2022 for a 24 hour race has been greeted with widespread acclaim.
Rightly so, it’s the return of world championship motorcycle racing to one of the world’s most iconic circuits.
But despite the huge amount of potential in the move, calendar clashes mean that a huge missed opportunity takes some of the gloss off the announcement.
That’s because while the news should make for a huge event in motorcycle racing given the pedigree of Spa and its famous 24 hour race, which previously ran from 1973 to 2003, it won’t get the attention that it deserves thanks to MotoGP lining up at Barcelona on the same weekend.
That’s a huge pity, because if there’s one form of motorbike racing that deserves more attention than it already gets, it’s endurance racing.
Perhaps the greatest remaining open competition in bike racing thanks to major involvement from multiple manufacturers, a truly open tyre war the sort of which barely exists in any championship nowadays and some of the best riders of all nationalities, it’s a real hidden gem of racing.
Yet it’s always played not just second fiddle to MotoGP, but outside of the rabid French fanbase, it doesn’t even get the attention given to British Superbikes or MotoAmerica let alone World Superbikes.
Reinvigorated somewhat in recent years since the 2015 takeover by Eurosport’s events division, 2021 in particular produced a fantastic battle that went down to the final round at Most before 2014 WSB champion Sylvain Guintoli and team-mates Xavier Simeon and Gregg Black retained the title for Suzuki France’s SERT effort.
While Guintoli became the first rider since the likes of Carl Fogarty and Doug Polen in the mid-nineties to win both an endurance championship and a sprint title as well, he’s very much a modern outlier in doing something that used to be a regular occurrence.
It used to be the norm to for big names from MotoGP and WSB in particular to be parachuted into what was always a relatively short endurance calendar to boost title chances and crowd excitement.
That was in particular a hallmark of the Suzuka 8 Hours, still endurance racing’s blue riband event and possibly the single most important race of the year for Japanese manufacturers. Past winners of that race include names like Valentino Rossi, Wayne Gardner, Mick Doohan and Wayne Rainey.
We saw a brief return to that level after Eurosport’s takeover, as Honda, desperate to take back the crown after a few years of Yamaha dominance at its home race, dispatched the likes of Casey Stoner, Jack Miller and Taka Nakagami.
They in turn took on Jonathan Rea, Pol Espargaro, Bradley Smith and Toprak Razgatlioglu, setting up some amazing battles at Suzuka as it looked like endurance racing was returning to its all-star heritage.
But there were no MotoGP riders at Suzuka the last time the race ran in 2019, and it’s hard to imagine that there’ll be any lining up at it or any other endurance race in 2022 for the same reasons that the Spa race won’t get the full attention it deserves: crowded calendars and competition.
The most obvious problem is that it’s increasingly impossible for a manufacturer to ask a MotoGP rider to take time away from what is now a 21-round series to do anything else, let alone race in a 24 hour race on a bike they’re unfamiliar with.
We’re even seeing sponsor and PR events being curtailed as MotoGP tries to squeeze in as many races as possible, and in recent seasons it’s been vital to use the summer break for rest, recuperation and in some cases surgery rather than two or three trips to Japan to prepare for Suzuka.
But on a more complicated level, the increase in interest in EWC since Eurosport’s takeover is a direct threat to Dorna, its rival promoter that controls both MotoGP and WSB.
That’s why, for example, a clash-heavy calendar in 2021 led to the MotoE series being gutted of many of its top names – who all had EWC commitments too – after Dorna reportedly issued an edict that riders would have to choose between committing to one promotor or another.
Names like Xavier Simeon, Niccolo Canepa and Randy de Puniet, formerly frontrunners in the electric series as well as big name draws to the fledgling championship, were forced to choose a path one way or another – and with endurance racing offering a better paycheque, it was an easy choice for most.
It’s a shame, because endurance racing deserves better. It’s never going to be a series that challenges MotoGP’s dominance as the premier class in the same way that the World Endurance Championship will never surpass Formula 1 even if Le Mans remains a bigger deal than any individual F1 race.
But just like it’s always a special thing when you see big names from open wheeled racing heading to the French countryside for 24 hours of hell behind the wheel, there’s a romantic charm to it all, and it’ll be a shame to lose that forever thanks to an increasingly crowded schedule.
