Wildcards for Australian MotoGP - for those of us fossils not on Arsebook

[steveyb]

Seven all up – six riders from Australia, including some old and new, and a fast femme from New Zealand

Motorcycling Australia (MA) has announced the wildcard recipients for the 2011 Iveco Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix at Phillip Island from October 14-16.

A total of seven wildcards have been selected, with MA nominating four and the FIM the remaining three. Five will compete in the 125cc class and two in Moto2.

Among the wildcards is current Australian Superlites Championship runaway leader Josh Hook (and former Red Bull Rookies rider), three-time 125cc wildcard Nicky Diles, rising star Alex Phillis and Tom Hatton. Hook was 18th in last year’s 125cc GP at Phillip Island.

Hatton is a late inclusion as a replacement for Arthur Sissis, who has just completed a highly successful Red Bull Rookies Cup season as a support class to selected MotoGP European rounds, where he finished second overall. Sissis now has committmenmts in Europe which will preclude him from being in Australia when the GP is on.

Rounding out the Moto125 recipients will be New Zealand female rider Avalon Biddle, who received an FIM wildcard.

Blake Leigh-Smith returns to Australia from Spain to take a Moto2 wildcard, and will be joined by 2010 Kirk McCarthy Memorial Award winner Kris McLaren.

2011 Australian MotoGP wildcard recipients

125cc

Arthur Sissis, Virginia, SA (Tom Hatton)
Josh Hook, Taree, NSW
Nicky Diles, Boronia, Vic
Alex Phillis, Heathmont, Vic
Avalon Biddle, New Zealand

Moto2

Blake Leigh-Smith, Runaway Bay, Qld
Kris McLaren, Leongatha, Vic

[ac3_snow]

fuck yea!! go Avalon!!!!!

[wharfy]

fuck yea!! go Avalon!!!!!

What he said !!!

[DidJit]

That's awesome!

[koba]

That is so bloody cool!

[Crasherfromwayback]

Best of luck Avalon. Be an awesome experience for her!!!

[Mental Trousers]

So that makes 9 to download then (FP2, Qualifying and Race for each of 125cc, Moto2, MotoGP)

Good show young lady

[k14]

Woah that is awesome. I hope she has a really good bike for it, just qualifying for the race will be a monumental achievement. If PI put on it's typical GP weekend weather it could be a very tough weekend. Fingers crossed for her and her team!

[Sarah311]

Seven all up – six riders from Australia, including some old and new, and a fast femme from New Zealand

Was talking about this on the weekend and hoping someone would post (read, a boy to post) - so excited for her, the beautiful flowing lines of Phillip Island should/will suit her as she is wicked through sweepers - and fearless. Certainly hoping the weather will be better than last year - hard to be worse actually!!
Yay for girl-power, making it count when it counts!!

[Dutchee]

Seven all up – six riders from Australia, including some old and new, and a fast femme from New Zealand

Was talking about this on the weekend and hoping someone would post (read, a boy to post) - so excited for her, the beautiful flowing lines of Phillip Island should/will suit her as she is wicked through sweepers - and fearless. Certainly hoping the weather will be better than last year - hard to be worse actually!!
Yay for girl-power, making it count when it counts!!

Umm, it was pretty typical PI weather last year. Bit worse than I've seen it the previous number of years, but not that different. (Hence the talk of moving it to early in the season, when the weather's supposedly better).

hehe, bumped into Av and her dad over there last year, on the day they were doing drainage work trying to get the track to actually open again (Friday). Pretty sure she was quite happy not to be riding that day, but this year she'll be itching to get out there, no doubt.

How big are banners allowed to be? I reckon we need to make at least one for her.

AC3 - you any good at making banners? Got some old sheets we could make it on, and thinking you could take it to buckets up here for everyone to sign, and Captian_Bubble could bring it to Melbourne for us to hold up.

[Sarah311]

Umm, it was pretty typical PI weather last year. Bit worse than I've seen it the previous number of years, but not that different. (Hence the talk of moving it to early in the season, when the weather's supposedly better).

hehe, bumped into Av and her dad over there last year, on the day they were doing drainage work trying to get the track to actually open again (Friday). Pretty sure she was quite happy not to be riding that day, but this year she'll be itching to get out there, no doubt.

I can only recall practice or racing being cancelled two other times at PI, and one was for Supers, since the early 1990's. I'm used to it being cold at the GP too, corners aren't called Siberia for nothing lol - but I wouldn't be opposed to them moving it to another date....
That said Avalon has raced the Winter Series more than once, and I'm sure she'll cope with the conditions whatever they may be, and do herself proud.

[k14]

This is this weekend guys! Keep an eye out for Avalon. Iirc this is the first time a Kiwi has raced in any world GP class since Dennis Charlet raced 125 at PI about 10 years ago.