Murray Walker, for many decades the television voice of Formula One has described it as “the greatest motorsport event in the world”.

In stark contrast Mark Scaife, former Australian V8 Supercar champion describes it as “the most dangerous road race on earth – dead-set dangerous – absolute lunacy”.

And the source of such divided opinion?  The Isle of Man Tourist Trophy races, what else?

And you can keep an eye out for what’s happening this year on this pit webcam …

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Despite Walker’s long association with Formula One he remains a devoted fan of the TT and is a regular visitor.  His father Graham was a Rudge Works rider and a winner of the Lightweight TT in 1931.  Scaife visited the Island for the first time in 2011 to host a TV documentary on Cameron Donald, Australia’s most recent TT winner.

There is of course a lot of truth in what both men have said.  Along with the Indy 500 it is one of the great motorsport events in the world and it does have a high element of risk.  More than 240 riders have died there, including seven New Zealanders.

The Isle of Man TT races ran for the first time over the 37¾ mile mountain course in 1911 and despite breaks for the two world wars and a year lost to the threat of Foot and Mouth disease in 2001, the event has been running ever since.  The format is well established with a week each for practice and racing and the Senior TT, the Holy Grail of the TT calendar is always the last race on Friday the last day.  Last year, for the first time ever, the Senior TT was rained out.

Practice for this year’s event began last Saturday 25th May with speed controlled laps for solo and sidecar newcomers.  Practice and qualifying for all classes takes place every evening from 6pm till 9pm.  This year the classes are again Superbikes, Superstock (1000cc), Supersport (600cc), Lightweight (250cc) and Sidecars.  There is also now an SES TT Zero class race of one lap for electric prototype machines.

Racing will get underway with the Superbike TT noon start on Saturday 1st June and the first Sidecar race will follow at 4pm.  The remaining six races will be spread through the week on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.  The Supersport and Sidecar classes have two races each.  And of course there are no massed starts at the TT.  Riders are flagged away individually at 10-second intervals, the fastest qualifiers going first.  The Senior and the Superbike TT’s are both of six laps, the Supersport four, and the Lightweight and Sidecar TT’s of three laps each.  The fastest riders complete a lap in about 17 minutes at an average speed of around 130mph.

Once again New Zealand interest in the TT will be on a high with Kiwi Bruce Anstey a confirmed starter and a rider very much on form as well, as he showed in the North-West 200 last week when he finished a close second to Irish rider Alistair Seeley in a last-lap shoot-out in the Superstock event before rain washed out the rest of the meeting.

Anstey, now 43 years of age and a winner at Wanganui’s Cemetery Circuit on his last visit home in 2004, is our country’s most successful rider ever at the Isle of Man. He has nine TT wins and is chasing more.  And he is giving himself every opportunity with a start in five races this year.

His last TT win was the first Supersport race last year when he edged out Australian Cameron Donald by 0.77 secs for the second closest win in the history of TT racing.  His HM Plant Padgetts Honda team-mate, the super-cool, smooth-as Englishman John McGuinness, 42 years, is the current outright lap record holder and is chasing his 20th TT win.  He is second on the all-time winners list behind the late Joey Dunlop who ended his career with 26 wins, his last when he was 48 years old.  McGuiness starts the meeting this year as star favourite.

Michael Dunlop, 24, (a nephew of the late Joey), also had a very close second place at the North-West 200 to Alistair Seeley in the Supersport race.  Dunlop takes risks but if he stays on he will be a serious challenge to the TT aspirations of both Anstey and McGuiness.  He has three TT wins to his credit the most recent being the second Supersport TT last year.

The colourful, eccentric Guy Martin, 31, with the indecipherable North England accent and the tall, gangly, relaxed Conor Cummins, 27, Manx born and bred, will both be familiar to the expected 70,000 spectators.

They will be remembered for their spectacular accidents in 2010, Martin’s ending in a fireball at Ballagarey (the same corner where New Zealander Paul Dobbs died the same year) and Cummins spiralling into the air before disappearing over the mountainside in a mind-numbing 150mph crash off The Verandah.

His injuries were described by his surgeon at Royal Liverpool Hospital as the type only found in medical text books.  Martin raced at the Cemetery Circuit in 2004.  Cummins may do so this year.  Both have yet to win at the Isle of Man and both are quick enough to do so.  Both also know the risks better than most.

Australian Cameron Donald, 35, a friend of New Zealand motorcycling and set to ride a Ken McIntosh Manx Norton at the Isle of Man Classic Festival in August has returned for the TT’s, riding for the successful Ireland-based Craig Wilson Honda team.  The likeable Donald is a serious contender to add to his two TT wins so far. He has hinted strongly we may see at the Cemetery Circuit this year.

The Isle of Man TT races never fail to surprise or shock.  Perhaps all is best expressed in a small paragraph in the Media Press Pack under the heading “No Place for Wimps”;

“With a course that has remained largely untouched since 1911, the 37 plus miles of public roads captures the imagination like no other motorcycling venue can. Whether it’s the tight and twisty roads through tree-lined glens, the narrow villages with their pubs,          pubs telegraph poles and phone boxes, or the open spaces of the mountaintops, the TT Course never ceases to amaze and astound. It remains the ultimate test of man and machine. These are real roads. These are real heroes. This is real racing.”

© Words by Ray Witham, www.BikesportNZ.com