Off-road Racing ... On August 14, 2010, a modified Ford Ranger pickup truck, racing in the MDR sanctioned "California 200", careered off the track into a group of spectators, killing eight, and raising questions about the future of offroad racing on public lands... Short course racing Short course off-road racing has races on a circuit of less than five miles (such as Crandon International Off-Road Raceway), which are sanctioned by CORR (or its predecessor SODA), and by World Series of Off Road Racing (WSORR)... Another format made popular by the Mickey Thompson Entertainment Group was called stadium racing, where offroad racing vehicles were used in a temporary offroad racetrack was constructed inside a stadium...
Track Racing ... Nature of the sport Track racing involves between 4 and 6 sometimes 8 competitors riding around an oval track in a counter-clockwise direction over a set amount of laps - usually 4 to 6 sometimes 8 - with points being awarded to all but the last finisher on a sliding scale...
Motorcycle Racing ... Sidecar racing has many sub-categories including: – Sidecarcross (sidecar motocross) – Sidecar trials – F1/F2 road racing True road racing See also: Isle of Man TT See also: North West 200 True road racing is run on tracks built from closed public and/or park roads and sometimes extra pieces of purpose built track... In the past true road racing was very commonplace but today few races have survived and even fewer have been added... Only one truly international championship exists at present by the name of "International Road Racing Championship" (IRRC)...
Stock Car Racing ... Today most American stock cars may superficially resemble standard American family sedans, but are in fact purpose-built racing machines built to a strict set of regulations governing the car design ensuring that the chassis, suspension, engine, etc... For example, NASCAR Sprint cup series (the highest racing series in the world) now requires fuel injection... In the UK and New Zealand there is a racing formula called stock cars but the cars are markedly different from any road car you might see...
Drag Racing ... Basics of drag racing Before each race (also known as a pass), each driver is allowed to perform a burnout, which heats the driving tires and lays rubber down at the beginning of the track, improving traction...
Ice Racing ... In the late 1960s ice racing was staged at a number of rinks in Scotland but the machines used were rally based machines with all season tires Tires Ice racing tires are either studded or non-studded... Through 2008, Menard's Racing in Wisconsin manufactured and sold studded racing tires for cars, and they were required in many ice-racing classes... Motorcycle ice racing Ice racing includes a motorcycle class which is the equivalent of Speedway on ice...
Greyhound Racing In Great Britain ... This was the first attempt of introducing mechanical racing to the UK, however it did not catch on at the time... Greyhound racing was brought to Britain from America by Charles Munn, an American businessman who obtained the overseas rights to the mechanical lure (hare)... His business partners were Alfred Critchley and Francis Gentle and together they formed the Greyhound Racing Association (GRA) and raised £25,000 to build a racecourse at Belle Vue...
Rallying ... From then on, racing in Europe (apart from Italy) would be on closed circuits, initially on long loops of public highway and then, in 1907, on the first purpose-built track, England's Brooklands...
Harness Racing In New Zealand ... The New South Wales bred, Lawn Derby, racing un-hoppled, was the first pacer to break the two-minute barrier in Australia or New Zealand when he recorded 1:59.4 at the Addington track in New Zealand in 1938...
Motocross ... In 1952, the FIM, motorcycling's international governing body, created an individual European Championship using a 500 cc engine displacement formula. In 1957, it was upgraded it to World Championship status...
Auto Racing ... Sixty-nine cars started the 50 km (31 mi) selection event that would show which entrants would be allowed to start the main event, the 127 km (79 mi) race from Paris to Rouen. The entrants ranged from serious manufacturers like Peugeot, Panhard or De Dion to amateur owners, and only 25 were selected for the main race...
Touring Car Racing ... Whilst not nearly as fast as Formula One, the similarity of the cars both to each other and to fans' own vehicles makes for entertaining, well-supported racing... The lesser impact of aerodynamics also means that following cars have a much easier time of passing than F1, and the more substantial bodies of the cars makes the occasional nudging for overtaking much more acceptable as part of racing... Regulations are usually designed to limit costs by banning some of the more exotic technologies available (for instance, many series insist on a "control tyre" that all competitors must use) and keep the racing close (sometimes by ballast weight where winning a race requires the winner's car to be heavier for subsequent races)...
Enduro ... Certainly part of the confusion stems from the fact that rallies and enduros share two pronounced qualities; they are usually lengthy compared to most forms of motorsport racing and they cover varying off-road terrain, usually without repeating any section of the terrain in the course of an event...
Hillclimbing ... It is one of the oldest forms of motorsport, since the first known hillclimb at La Turbie near Nice, France took place as long ago as 31 January 1897. The hillclimb held at Shelsley Walsh, in Worcestershire, England is the world's oldest continuously staged motorsport event still staged on its original course, having been first run in 1905...
Road Racing ... Road racing occasionally is conducted using the infield and oval portions of tracks making a "roval", such as the 24 Hours of Daytona... Hosting a road racing tradition since 1926 at Phillip Island, Victoria, Australia, the photograph at right shows motorcycle racing at a new track, called the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit, which opened in 1989 with the World Motorcycle Championships...
Further Reading: Horse Racing
Parimutuel Betting ... The parimutuel system is used in gambling on horse racing, greyhound racing, jai alai, and all sporting events of relatively short duration in which participants finish in a ranked order. A modified parimutuel system is also used in some lottery games...
Thoroughbred ... The Thoroughbred as it is known today was developed in 17th and 18th-century England, when native mares were crossbred with imported Oriental stallions of Arabian, Barb, and Turkoman breeding. All modern Thoroughbreds can trace their pedigrees to three stallions originally imported into England in the 17th century and 18th century, and to a larger number of foundation mares of mostly English breeding...