Hosting the inaugural FIM Intercontinental Games (ICG) over the weekend of 30 November and 1 December 2024, the Circuito de Jerez – Ángel Nieto is located near the historic city of Jerez de la Frontera, deep within the sherry-producing region of southern Spain.
Opened at the end of 1985, the circuit was renamed in 2018 in memory of Spanish motorcycle legend Ángel Nieto who won thirteen FIM World Championship titles and ninety Grands Prix in an illustrious career that ran from 1964 until 1986 and was characterised by his mastery of smaller capacity machines.
The first time a Spanish Motorcycle Grand Prix was held there was in 1987 when Australia’s Wayne Gardner came out on top and since 1987 it has hosted a round of the championship every year with the list of former winners reading like a who’s who of the sport and including such iconic names as Eddie Lawson, Mick Doohan, Valentino Rossi, Jorge Lorenzo, Marc Márquez and Francesco Bagnaia.
Set in a slight valley, the Circuito de Jerez – Ángel Nieto is a focal point for a city fanatical about sport and is blessed with consistently good weather and beautiful scenery with its numerous grandstands providing the perfect viewing facilities for spectators.
The circuit has two main configurations for car and motorcycle racing and its testing curves, corners and straights bear testament to some of the greats who have raced there including Sito Pons, Dani Pedrosa, Àlex Crivillé, Jorge Lorenzo and Ayrton Senna.
With its thirteen turns, the motorcycle circuit is just under four-and-a-half kilometres long with the lap record currently standing at 1:37.449, recorded this year by the then reigning MotoGP™ champion Bagnaia. Nicolò Bulega also set a new record of 1:38.528 for FIM Superbike World Championship competitors in 2024.
With classes at the first-ever ICG limited to Supersport and Supersport 300, representatives of the six FIM Continental Unions (CONU) of North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America and Oceania will find Bulega’s Supersport lap record of 1:41.875 set in 2023 a better benchmark to aim for and the Supersport 300 record was also broken this season when Gonzalo Sanchez posted a lap time of 1:51.713.
The ICG is a biennial event and each CONU is fielding a team comprising eight riders split equally across both classes. In keeping with the FIM’s commitment to diversity, each CONU must field at least one female rider in each class. In addition, each CONU must appoint a Captain in each class who is expected to motivate their team-mates as well as provide advice and direction, take charge of media and promotional responsibilities and in general act as a positive role model.
On-track activity on the Saturday (30 November) gets under way at 9:30am with the first of four thirty-minute Free Practice sessions, two per class, before the first of four twenty-minute afternoon Qualifying sessions.
The points-paying action is scheduled to start on Sunday (1 December) at 11am with a fourteen-lap Supersport 300 race followed by the opening sixteen-lap Supersport race that gets under way at noon. Each class will then race once more with the combined scores deciding the overall finishing positions.
The winner of each race will score twenty-four points with twenty-three for second and twenty-two for third, decreasing at a rate of one-point-per-position down to a single point for twenty-fourth. All results will count towards a CONU’s final total and there are individual trophies in both classes for the best performances by male and female competitors.
Organised with the support of la Junta de Andalucía, the City of Jerez FIM Intercontinental Games brings together forty-eight riders from nineteen countries and takes place on 30 November and 1 December 2024 at the Circuito de Jerez – Ángel Nieto in Southern Spain.
Published by: Isabelle Larivière – FIM Communications Manager