R.I.P.
I guess people who race the TT enjoy its risks as well, but I never was nor will ever be a fan of this race. Can't stand to see people losing their life when they could do pretty much the exact same sport in "normal" tracks with a loss less risk. Just my own 2 cents of course.
A lot of it is down to money, in 2015 up and coming Irish racer Nico Mawhinney was offered two very different deals for that year.
He was offered a ride in the British Superstock Championship that year but he had to cough up £34,000 for the season, not including costs for crash damage.
His second offer was for 5 bikes to ride in every class on the roads and he could keep all of his sponsorship money and any start or prize money he got.
Peter Hickman was in a similar boat, he lost his ride in 2013 and couldn't afford to buy his way into a team, so he took an offer to do the roads as it didn't cost him anything and since he took to it like a duck to water it raised his profile and he's since got decent rides in BSB, he's since said that despite having 10 years of experience in the British Championships including a Superstock title, he was living hand to mouth until he started doing the roads.
The late William Dunlop one year was competing in the British 125 championship as well as doing a select few road races, after a particularly bad NW200 in which he suffered machine problems he announced he couldn't continue to do the British championship because he was relying on the prize money from the North West to see out the season.
In 2016 Ian Hutchinson won 3 TT races and finished runner up in the other 2, he took home almost £60,000 in prize money, the same year he also finished runner up in the British Superstock series and got no prize money for it.
Simply put as dangerous as road racing is and how tragically it can go wrong, it's cheaper than circuit racing and if you're good at it you can make a fair living out of it.
I love the British Superbike Championship but it staggers me how the organisers and commentators go on about it being the best domestic series in the world yet there isn't a penny in prize money yet it cost's around £300,000 a season to just run a one bike team and to put that in perspective you could do the TT for 3 or 4 years on that sort of budget with 2 or 3 classes of bike.
