While the turnout was a success, the organising committee is keen to ensure that lessons are learnt from the injury-resulting incidents from this year’s event.
After five days of races and competitions, this year’s Burt Munro Challenge wrapped yesterday with its traditional street race.
The sunny day attracted thousands of people, who watched bikers from across the country testing their machines and speed in the roads of the industrial zone of the city.
Along with his wife Sue and his son Aaron, Owen Miller, of Woodlands, said the event was a family tradition for them.
"Every year I take the whole week off to be able to watch all the races.
"It is a staggering event and there is nowhere else in New Zealand that has this amount of races and motorbikes in one place. So it’s worth taking my leave," he said.
Invercargill’s Kate Little also took her children to the event as her oldest son Myles (9) was passionate about motorbikes.
"We’ve been bringing them since they were very young. I think Myles was 3 at the time.
"He loves the speed and hearing the hum of the bikes."
Organising committee chairman Craig Hyde said the week was a rollercoaster.
It started with wet weather and five spectators sustaining injuries after incidents at Bluff Hill Climb on Thursday but then the sun came out, which guaranteed great turnout for the weekend’s events, he said.
"Obviously, we started with a bit of rain ... and then we went into racing and Thursday was a bit of a disappointment for everyone — with the injuries.
"And then on Friday things had improved — the Beach [race] was fantastic. It was an early one because of the tides but we still got a good crowd of 2000 people."
He was pleased with the turnout during the five-day event as it was the biggest numbers he had ever seen.
"We had the biggest numbers right across the board. People just came back racing because obviously we didn’t have it last year so a lot of people have been waiting for the event [to] comeback.
"We had great crowds in the gates as well. It is great to see people out supporting the event because that’s what we need."
After the injuries on Bluff Hill, he said the committee would have a look at the safety measures for future events.
"It is nothing that is going to be fixed overnight, but we will have more measures in place for the next time."
They were unsure what those measures were, but he was certain the committee would figure out what was best for the competitors and spectators.
He said the event was on track to come back in 2024.
WATCH VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE BURT MUNRO CHALLENGE HERE;
https://www.odt.co.nz/features/channel-39/burt-munro-challenge-2023-high...
