Long-running Brighton Speed Trials event is axed amid rising costs
The 118-year history of the Brighton National Speed Trials has come to an end after the organising Brighton & Hove Motor Club pulled the plug on the event last week.
At a meeting with landowner Brighton & Hove City Council, the club conceded that the seafront sprint event on Madeira Drive – which was first held in 1905 – was no longer financially viable.
Reduced revenue, ranged against steeply rising costs, were blamed for the event’s axing. The reduction in paying spectator attendance since the terraces above the course and arches were closed in 2013 hit council and club accounts, while the worsening road surface and necessity to install and remove costly safety barrier infrastructure for one day has resulted in entries dwindling.
“For some it was the only event they participated in,” said a BHMC spokesperson. “For others, it was a focal part of their motoring year, entering high-powered vehicles which roared along the seafront to the enjoyment of the crowds.
“Its appeal to young and old alike was intimacy. Spectators could get up close to the cars waiting in the paddock, talk to the drivers, take wonderful pictures and feel very involved.
“Despite Brighton & Hove Council’s help, the new road layouts, the closing of the terraces, and the enormous cost involved in providing required safety measures, the committee had to make the heartbreaking decision that the 2023 event was the last.
“The club has [run it] at a loss for a number of years and cannot continue to do so.”
Photo by: Motorsport Images
The event attracted enormous crowds and some top drivers back in its heyday
Long staged for cars and motorcycles, the Brighton National Speed Trials had a chequered past, including several competitor fatalities, the most recent a sidecar passenger in 2012.
A six-figure insurance claim by BHCC following a high-speed incident at the 2022 event has yet to be resolved.
The course has been over a standing-start quarter-mile with a two-litre limit on single-seaters since Simon Law’s fatal 1993 crash in Tony Marsh’s Rovercraft.
The BHMC is still organising its two regular sprints at Goodwood this season, plus a concours “and hopefully a hillclimb”.
The club also thanked all those who entered the Speed Trials over the years, as well as the marshals and volunteers who helped make the event happen.
Simon Paul will go down as its final winner, with a 9.84-second quarter mile in September 2023 in a road-legal Nissan GTR.
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