ORCi Statement - Coronavirus Pandemic

The UK Government has issued further guidance to event organisers with a recommendation that people should not attend pubs, theatres and large gatherings and to protect the NHS, frontline services are unable to support such events due to the resources required by the emergency services.

Scotland earlier advised that all gatherings attended by 500 people or more should not take place effective from 16th March.

Having reviewed this information the ORCi have heeded the request from the Government for businesses to act responsibly, and, as such have taken the difficult decision to temporarily suspend future race meetings at ORCI venues until such time as guidance from the Government changes.

Whilst we recognise the news will be disappointing for race fans and drivers alike, our highest priority must be to ensure the safety of all who attend our events, and protect the resilience of the UK’s public services – especially the emergency services and the NHS – as strongly advised to by the Government. To ignore this advice would be deeply irresponsible given the current circumstances.

Whilst ORCi venues employ their own paramedic, first aid and safety steward team, including private ambulances, we all know that motorsport can be dangerous, and incidents can and do happen which require the attendance of the emergency services. It is impossible for any ORCi venue to legislate against the need to call on the assistance of the emergency services for either an on-track/in stadia incident, and as such we are unable to guarantee that we could proceed without making any call on the services which this government guidance seeks to protect.

As the ORCi we will of course continue to keep our race fans, race teams and individual promotions will keep team members informed of when we plan on resuming the fixture calendar for 2020 and will do this as soon as it is safe to do so. In the meantime, we encourage everyone to continue to follow the advice of the relevant authorities to ensure the well-being of themselves, their family’s and local communities, whilst sending a strong message of support to the health professionals and members of our emergency services and other key workers who are working so hard for our benefit during this period.

ORCi Ltd