1998 Speedway Grand Prix

The 1998 Speedway Grand Prix was the 53rd edition of the official World Championship.[1][2] It was the fourth season in the Speedway Grand Prix era used to determine the Speedway World Champion.[3]

1998 Speedway Grand Prix
Season details
DatesMay 15 - September 18
Events6
Cities6
Countries6
Riders21 permanents
3 wild card(s)
Heats144 (in 6 events)
Winners
Champion SWE Tony Rickardsson
Runner-up SWE Jimmy Nilsen
3rd place POL Tomasz Gollob

Tony Rickardsson won the World title, which included three wins from the six Grand Prix events. The Swede's win was his second World title success and he secured the gold medal comfortably ahead of nearest rivals Jimmy Nilsen and Tomasz Gollob.[4]

Event format

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The system used was a new one for the 4th SGP season with 24 riders, divided into two classes. The eight best would be directly qualified for the "Main Event", while the sixteen others would be knocked out if they finished out of the top two in 4-man heats on two occasions - while they would go through if they finished inside the top two on two occasions. This resulted in 10 heats, where eight proceeded to the Main Event, where exactly the same system was applied to give eight riders to a semi-final.

The semi-finals were then two heats of four, where the top two qualified for a final and the last two going towards the consolation final. The 4 finalists scored 25, 20, 18 and 16 points, with 5th to 8th scoring 15, 14, 12 and 10 point, and after that 8, 8, 7, 7, etc. Places after 8th place were awarded according to the time a rider was knocked out and, secondly, according to position in the last heat he rode in.

Qualification for Grand Prix

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The 1998 season had 21 permanent riders and 3 wild card at each event. The permanent riders are highlighted in the results table below.

Calendar

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Round Date City and venue Winner Runner-up 3rd placed 4th placed Results
1 May 15   Prague , Czech Republic
Markéta Stadium
  Tony Rickardsson   Billy Hamill   Jimmy Nilsen   Tomasz Gollob results
2 June 6   Pocking , Germany
Rottalstadion
  Tony Rickardsson   Jimmy Nilsen   Billy Hamill   Tomasz Gollob results
3 June 19   Vojens , Denmark
Speedway Center
  Hans Nielsen   Chris Louis   Tony Rickardsson   Jason Crump results
4 August 7   Coventry , Great Britain
Brandon Stadium
  Jason Crump   Jimmy Nilsen   Tomasz Gollob   Ryan Sullivan results
5 August 28   Linköping , Sweden
Motorstadium
  Tony Rickardsson   Chris Louis   Peter Karlsson   Greg Hancock results
6 September 18   Bydgoszcz , Poland
Polonia Stadium
  Tomasz Gollob   Ryan Sullivan   Jimmy Nilsen   Hans Nielsen results

Final standings

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Qualifies for next season's Grand Prix series
Full-time Grand Prix rider
Wild card, track reserve or qualified reserve
Pos. Rider Points CZE
 
GER
 
DEN
 
GBR
 
SWE
 
POL
 
    (4) Tony Rickardsson 111 25 25 18 8 25 10
    (8) Jimmy Nilsen 99 18 20 8 20 15 18
    (3) Tomasz Gollob 97 16 16 8 18 14 25
4   (7) Hans Nielsen 76 8 12 25 7 8 16
5   (18) Chris Louis 75 15 8 20 6 20 6
6   (1) Greg Hancock 69 6 10 14 15 16 8
7   (9) Ryan Sullivan 68 12 7 3 16 10 20
8   (10) Jason Crump 62 (+3) 3 3 16 25 7 8
9   (2) Billy Hamill 62 (+N) 20 18 6 12 5 1
10   (5) Mark Loram 52 6 7 10 7 8 14
11   (15) Leigh Adams 51 10 6 4 4 12 15
12   (22) (23) (24) Antonín Kasper, Jr. 50 7 4 15 14 3 7
13   (14) Stefan Dannö 49 14 6 7 10 5 7
14   (17) Andy Smith 43 2 14 5 4 6 12
15   (19) Henrik Gustafsson 43 8 15 6 6 2 6
16   (6) Brian Andersen 31 5 7 8 7 4
17   (23) (25) Peter Karlsson 27 1 8 18
18   (11) Armando Castagna 23 1 5 3 3 6 5
19   (12) Zoltan Adorjan 21 7 5 2 3 1 3
20   (16) Craig Boyce 18 3 4 1 1 4 5
21   (13) Piotr Protasiewicz 16 2 1 5 2 3 3
22   (21) Jesper B. Jensen 14 4 1 5 2 2
23   (22) Brian Karger 12 12
24   (20) Sebastian Ułamek 10 1 2 1 4 2
25   (22) (24) Gerd Riss 6 4 2
26   (23) Bohumil Brhel 5 5
26   (23) Joe Screen 5 5
28   (24) Lars Gunnestad 5 4 1
29   (24) Jacek Gollob 4 4
30   (27) Jacek Krzyżaniak 3 3
31   (23) Robert Barth 2 2
32   (24) Martin Dugard 2 2
33   (23) Robert Dados 1 1
Pos. Rider Points CZE
 
GER
 
DEN
 
GBR
 
SWE
 
POL
 

References

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  1. ^ "WORLD INDIVIDUAL FINAL - RIDER INDEX". British Speedway. Retrieved 10 July 2021.
  2. ^ "HISTORY SPEEDWAY and LONGTRACK". Speedway.org. Retrieved 10 July 2021.
  3. ^ "Speedway riders, history and results". wwosbackup. Retrieved 10 July 2021.
  4. ^ "Hoare, T. (1998) 'Hamill crashes out in Poland',". The Times. 21 September 1998. Retrieved 11 July 2021 – via Gale Primary Sources.
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