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https://www.sport.be/cyclocrossclassics/namur/nl/#
The last thing I'm aware of happening there was a VMX type thing, but more of an exhibition up on the concourse, in front of The Citadel, a few years back? Others here may well know otherwise, and info / reports / links, I, and I'm sure, many others, would be eternally grateful for.
I've often compared that having a race at Namur, would be akin to a race being held at Arlington National Cemetery , or, any one of the large, fabled Civil War battlefields, for USA peoples to get a grasp on Namur Citadels race stagings importance for the Belgians, and other Europeans and Brits. I think it was fabled as never having been 'conquered', at least until the hell of WW1.
And, the idea of an MX race in Central Park, New York , as mentioned earlier in this thread is another good comparison as a places importance to a Nations / Regions psyche.
The place is utterley magical, utterly magnificent, and utterly Fearful.
You owe it to yourself, to pull your finger out, stop belly button gazing, and get to Namur, Lommel( a flat as a tack sand pit in a light industrial area, soaked in the blood of warriors from eons of War, with Sand pounded by artillery bombardments into the most vicious of fine, bottomless 'nonsurfaces'), Valkenswaard and on and on and on, if you think you are an MXer. Bugger crap like glorified BMX tracks plonked down in Stadiums for our viewing 'comfort'.
We would usually drive out from Britain on the Saturday, sleep in the car Saturday night in a French layby, watch the race then drive home...and then go to Luxembourg the week after (the OLD Ettelbrouck track was nearly as bonkers as Namur).
I remember my dad telling me about the 60s when there were essentially no fences and the fans would hide behind trees in the middle of the track to get a better view and would block the track to stop riders if the Belgians weren't winning.
Not speaking French or Flemish we could never understand the commentators, and infact didn't even know for sure that Graham Noyce had won the World Title in 1979 until we were back on the ferry to Dover hours later and someone told us.
Also, for a race that was always the 1st weekend in August, it had it's fair share of mudders, with streams of water running inches deep down the roads and making some of the hills barely rideable.
The track got slowed down a little over the years by adding tight corners etc on the Citadel area and tabletops down in the section just after. They also tried to make things safer down near the Café du Monument area by dropping down off the bank earlier and adding the dirt to the road, but this really only meant that the bike were higher up than before so now at head height if they went over the barriers into the crowd
For what it's worth, a lot of the British 'lads' that went every year (particularly the later years) were pretty poorly behaved, monumentally drunk and i'm sure that the locals/organisers were glad to see the back of them when they finally decided to close the on site campsites
Presumably the richer local residents (it is bloody nice in that area of town) would get a bit uppity to have bikes chewing up their parks and verges again after all this time, but they do still have a cyclocross World Cup their every December and that makes a fair amount of mess. The potential damage to old cobbled roads is probably more of an issue these days than it was 25 years ago though, and presumably the whole historic castle/fort thing is more protected by law than it would have been years ago.
The Shop
DeCal Works Huge Plastic Inventory of UFO and Polisport kits.
I think some of this is Namur.
Am I right?
We were on a round trip from N Ireland taking in the GP at Fairley Castle UK
1st G Jobe, 2nd K Nicholl, 3rd Laurence Spence
Then toured round France for 3 weeks taking in Namur on the way back, Spence head butted a tree in practice & knocked himself silly (M Robert) helmet with some of the padding gouged out to fit Spences' large head, last Gp he raced, sadly
I remember a Belgium wildcard crashed into a tree in practice & a marshal pulled his helmet off and paralysed him.
Also when he 1st went to factory Kaw he went to work on his own bike & was told by his mechanic it's was his (mechanics) job so Spence was at a loose end, he was a good mechanic in his own right
I think this is the reason that The FIM never wants to race at Namur anymore.
Pit Row
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