Rallycross gods expedite in Hell

Hell in Norway is ready to welcome ERC contenders.

With Norwegian drivers at the top of all three ERC point standings the interest for Rallycross in the Scandinavian country is as high as never before, at least according to the organisers of the next ERC round to be held at the Lånkebanen of Hell near Stjørdal, about 45kms east of Trondheim. “We are ready to welcome the European circus for the weekend of June 24 to 26 in Hell. We will have more than 300 officials on service, all well prepared,” claims the chairman of the ERC round committee Steinar Vordal. NAF Motorsport Trøndelag is the formal organiser of the fourth round of the European Rallycross Championship 2011, but there will be people from lots of different places all over Norway involveld in the running of the event. And as there has been no ERC round in Norway over the past two years the expectations are high.

“This is something new for the most of us, but we invited many good motorsport officials to our aid. Our aim was to get as many as possible trained helpers from our own district involved, and we operate with a fairly long list of reserves to be prepared for all important features of the scenario,” tells chief security officer Steinar Nilsen. The Lånkebanen was opened in 1989, but an event as big as a European round has never been organised at the venue. The latest international event at Hell was in 2009, when a round of the so-called ‘Rallycross Norden’ series was won by World Rally Championship ace Henning Solberg. Over the last two years the track has been upgraded to be on par with the best Rallycross circuits all over Europe now and the results of the improvements have been hailed by FIA’s Off-Road Commission track observer Klaus Stich from Germany.

After the first three rounds of the ERC series Norwegian drivers are leading the point standings of all three categories, which is seen by the Hell organisers as an into the bargain advantage in terms of attractiveness of their event to pull many spectators to the Lånkebanen. 28-year-old Volvo C30 campaigner Frode Holte is on top of the Supercars class, 19-year-old Renault Clio driver Andreas Bakkerud leads the Super1600 field and 20-year-old Lars Øyvind Enerberg has ruled the TouringCar category in all three ERC rounds so far. This should give the ticket sale an extra impetus, is the common expectation in the Trøndelag region in the central part of Norway.

When Hell freezes over…

Hell is a small village of the Nord-Trøndelag county with a population of 1,418 [January 2009], located beside the European route E6 and south of the Trondheim Værnes Airport. Because of its name the village has become some kind of a tourist attraction, as visitors like to take photographs of its railway station. One of the station signs reads ‘Hell – Gods-Expedition’, the older Norwegian words for ‘Hell cargo-handling’ [‘godsekspedisjon’ would be the current spelling for ‘gods-expedition’]. Popular postcards show the station pictured during wintertime and with heavy frost on the ground, making jokes about “Hell frozen over”. However, the village’s name Hell stems from the old Norwegian word ‘hellir’, which means overhang or cliff cave. The most famous person of the village is Ms Mona Grudt, the elected ‘Miss Norway 1990’ and ‘Miss Universe 1990’. During the competition for the 1990 Miss Universe title she tagged herself as “The Beauty Queen From Hell”…

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