robhud

Sorry, I did not check back on the site. The event was held at Al Qadsia Football Club grounds. then one of the few stadiums with grass pitches.

Having dug back into my files the dates were in fact 23rd/24th November 1978

Sorry LeapingLena, your question was what was the date of the 1978 meeting. I cannot give you a precise date, my memory fails me but it was not 23/24 November, it was towards the beginning of the month and 8th comes to mind. I will dig through my old papers and see if I can get the actual date.

You are all quite a bit out with your guesstimates, the figure was in fact around 1,000 in 1978 on the two-day promotional event and they comprised mostly British expats. This was as I believe it, the first visit to Middle East countries. Whilst it was proclaimed as a success, there was little enthusiasm by the Arabs themselves, who had greater thrills and spills on their highways. For obvious reasons, motorcycling had in effect very few fans in Kuwait. However, Rothmans, who subsidised the events, were eager to cash in on the publicity under their area manager, John Dedman in an effort to popularise the old Craven A brand of cigarettes.. With Speedway Racing Developments Ltd, 1979 was organise with three participant countries, Egypt and Abu Dabi. The Speedway team came to Kuwait from Cairo, middle November 1979 with Reg Fearman as Clerk of the Course, his team included Terry Chandler (Negotiator and staff controller), Dave Lanning (Racing Controler, Announcer and Time Keeper) (also a sports reporter with thy Sun), and Eric Boothroyd (Administrative Executive & Machine Examiner) The riders were Peter Collins, Neil Middleditch, David Morton, John Davis,Jim McMillan, Chris Morton, Ian Cartwright, Richard Greer, Barry Thomas, Craig Pendlebury, Reg Wilson, Dave Jessup, John Louis, Les\Collins, Malcolm Simmons and Bernie Leigh. Once again it is doubtful the crowd reached a thousand, but any thoughts of future events in the Middle East were halted by the start of the Iran - Iraq war in 1980. After the final event, any of the riders came to my apartment, not least World Champ Peter Collins and 'old man' Bernie Leigh. They were unused to the power of home-brew and went back to their hotel joyous, collected by the Hotel minibus. It was reported that on the way back, an occupant bared his rear from a window of the bus which caused a great deal of furor, but a great roar of laughter went round the expat commniuty, and an element of envy! You just don't do things like that in Kuwait!!! The tour moved on to Abu Dhabi November 22nd. I have two programmes, one of which has the signatures of all the riders against their photographs. I will be auctioning this soon, probably Ebay!