The best riders in the world will go into battle this coming Sunday (24 September) when the 2023 FIM Long Track of Nations (LToN) is staged at Roden in the Netherlands.
Words and Feature image by World Long Track
A relatively new event on the FIM calendar, while the FIM Long Track World Championship can be traced back to 1971 – and the European series it superseded to 1957 – the LToN first roared into existence as recently as 2007 when it was staged at Morizès in France.
Most recently the venue for the fifth Final of this season’s FIM Long Track World Championship at the start of the month, Morizès went on to host two more LToNs – in 2010 and 2018 – and would have held a fourth in 2020 before the pandemic brought about its cancellation.
In that debut year the victory was claimed by Germany, the first of an historic six event winning streak for the country that no nation has managed to come close to matching since.
Germany is also the most successful nation in the history of the event with a total of nine victories, three seconds and a third with the 2013 edition in Swingfield, Great Britain being the only time they have failed to finish on the podium. So it is only fitting that the country has also hosted the most LToNs with the first time in 2008 in Werlte followed by Scheessel in 2011, Mühldorf in 2015, Vechta in 2019 and Herxheim last year.
To underline the dominance of Germany, tying for second position in the all-time winners’ list are France and the Netherlands with two each followed by Great Britain who picked up their sole victory in the competition when Mühldorf was the host venue.
France is the most recent country to defeat Germany in the LToN, having taken back-to-back victories in 2018 and 2019 and as well Morizès also staged the event at nearby St Macaire in 2012.
This year’s edition will be the third time the Netherlands – who won the competition in 2013 and again in 2016 – having played host following events at Eenrum in 2009 and Roden in 2017. They were also scheduled to stage the LToN in 2021 at the Speed Centre Roden, which lies around one-hundred-and-seventy kilometres north-east of Dutch capital Amsterdam, but that was also unfortunately cancelled due to the pandemic.
Finland staged the event in 2014 at Forssa before scoring their one and only podium finish with third the following year, while the Czech Republic – who have finished second once and third twice – held the 2016 edition at Mariánské Lázně.
This Sunday another entry in the LToN history books will be made and fans who are unable to make the journey to Roden will still be able to watch all the action on a Pay-Per-View broadcast via a livestream package on the Tapes Up TV channel. For more details click here.
