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Ballacraine traffic lights is a landmark place on the famous Isle of Man TT course. The TT course is 37.3 miles long and the motorcycle races are held on closed roads during the first week of June each year. The year 2007 will be the centenary year of the TT races which are undoubtedly the longest running road races in the world. This right hander on the course signifies the end of a high speed section of the circuit. It typically takes about 3.5 minutes to travel the 7 miles to get to this point with speeds approaching 180mph on some parts of this section. Following on from Ballacraine is about 4 miles of tight twisting roads where the riders are literally running between stone banks and brick walls. You may notice the staw bales that surround the Pine Wood Studios building that are there to protect the rider in the event of an accident (and not the walls as I overheard a visitor once quote!). Straw bales are used a lot around the course and there have been some air barriers installed in some of the high speed accident blackspots. The lap record was set in 2006 by John McGuinness riding a 1000cc Honda who covered the 37.3 mile road circuit in 17m 29.26s which equates to an unbelievable average speed of 129.451mph. The superbike and senior races are 6 laps in length and require 2 pit stops to refuel the bike. Will the 2007 races see the 130mph average barrier broken?
Shortcut to this page: http://worldwidepanorama.org/wwp_rss/go/n2957
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