Australian speedway racing born fast before big crowds at Adelaide's Wayville Showgrounds in the 1920s and 1930s

In 1928, Adelaide's Wayville, showgrounds, hosting the first of its Australia solo titles, was promoted as “the world's fastest dirt track speedway”.
Image courtesy State Library of South Australia

Adelaide's Wayville Showgrounds’ main arena in the 1920s/30s has been claimed as the birthplace of Australian speedway.

The Showgrounds’ main arena became Speedway Royal during that era, peaking between 1926 and 1934, when it could hold regular crowds of 25,000 and attract world champions such as Lionel van Pragg.

In 1928, Wayville, hosting the first of its Australia solo titles, was promoted as “the world's fastest dirt track speedway”. This was when schoolboy Kym Bonython, later a speedcar driver and promoter of Rowley Park speedway, got his first taste of the sport.

Wayville stopped holding speedway meetings after 1934, possibly because it disrupted harness racing on the area or because of the Great Depression.

Other than demonstration runs at the Royal Adelaide Show, speedway wouldn't return to Wayville for 52 years with the first West End Speedway International in 1986 featuring some of the world’s best motorcycle riders.

Wayville hosted the Series 500 (Australian Masters Series) featuring world championship riders between 1995 and 2000. In 1994, Wayville had the Australia v. England motorcycle speedway test. The World Series Sprintcars also raced at Wayville.

After Wayville’s original closure in 1934, the venue gap for Midgets, solo and sidecar was filled briefly by the Camden Motordrome until World War II and by Rocky Marshall’s short-lived meetings around Kilburn Oval after the war.