1997 Individual Long Track World Championship

The 1997 Individual Long Track/Grasstrack World Championship was the 27th edition of the FIM speedway Individual Long Track World Championship.[1] For the first time the Championship was decided on a Grand Prix system (a series of races) and also contained races on grasstrack.[2]

1997 Individual Long Track World Championship

The new system combined with the relatively new Speedway World Championship Grand Prix which started in 1995, effectively resulted in a separation of speedway riders. The leading speedway riders (with the exception of several Long Track specialists) could not commit to the Longtrack/Grasstrack schedule and therefore competed in the Speedway World Championship. The days of a speedway world champion in both normal track and Long Track speedway were gone.

The world title was won by Tommy Dunker of Germany.[3][4]

Venues

Round	Date	Venue
1	12 Jul	Aduard
2	20 Jul	Cloppenburg
3	17 Aug	Pfarrkirchen
4	6 Sep	Marmande
5	28 Sep	Mariánské Lázně

Final Classification

Pos	Rider	Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Total Pts
1	Tommy Dunker	20	10	25	16	18	89
2	Steve Schofield	11	25	11	13	25	85
3	Glenn Cunningham	25	16	16	8	11	76
4	Massimo Mora	13	13	8	18	16	68
5	Egon Müller	5	18	20	9	14	66
6	Zdenek Schneiderwind	18	11	12	14	10	65
7	Phillipe Berge	12	9	18	12	13	64
8	Matthias Kröger	9	20	14	7	12	62
9	Steve Johnston	16	8	9	20	5	58
10	Jeremy Doncaster	14	14	13	4	9	54
11	Paul Hurry	6	12	1	25	7	51
12	Bohumil Brhel	8	7	7	1	20	43
13	Pavel Ondrašík	7	2	10	10	6	35
14	Christophe Dubernard	10	3	6	11	2	32
15	Vladimir Trofimov	4	x	5	2	8	19
16	Herbert Rudolph	3	4	3	3	4	17
17	Thorsten Kerl	2	5	2	x	1	10
18	Václav Milík Sr.	x	x	4	x	3	7
19	Adam Labedzki	x	x	x	6	x	6
20	Shane Parker	x	6	x	x	x	6
21	Oleg Kurguskin	x	x	x	5	x	5
22	Walter Scherwitzki	1	x	x	x	x	1
23	Mark Lemon	x	1	x	x	x	1

References

1. "SPEEDWAY and LONGTRACK". Speedway.org.
2. "World Longtrack World Champions". Grasstrack GB.
3. "Long Track Racing". Speedway Champions.
4. Montague, Trevor (2004). A To Z of Sport, page 512. Little Brown. ISBN 0-316-72946-9.