Ian, I don`t recall either Brian or myself expressing surprise at the death of Paul Dobbs, indeed I am never surprised by deaths at the TT races, saddened, yes.......surprised, no.
But to sanitise the TT would be to ruin it as the truly unique event it is in the racing calendar, there simply is not another event like it, I have attended it on four occasions, once on the sad occasion that Dave Jeffries died, and it has never once failed to leave me totally spellbound.
I love ALL my racing, but nothing else leaves me with that feeling, certainly not F1, not even MotoGP (although I love that too)
In many ways, it is a throwback to bygone days of what I would call `proper` racing......most other racing is sanitised now, and I`m not arguing against that, or any other safety improvements, you only had to see what Mike Conway got away with the other week to know that, a mere 10 years ago, he certainly wouldn`t have survived that.
One thing I do know is, if you were to take a vote of riders, spectators, marshals, stewards and other army of TT volunteers, you would be met with a resounding `leave it alone`.
Whether that is right or wrong is arguable, but it is how I would vote too, and, again, rightly or wrongly, you cannot classify the TT meeting as `another race meeting`, it is, truly unique.
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