HANS ANDERSEN – CHAMPION IN WAITING
BY RICHARD CLARKE (UK)
As speedway fans the world over search for a rider capable of knocking three times World Champion Nicki Pedersen off his perch, many Europeans believe the most robust challenge will come from fellow countryman Hans Andersen in 2009. Hans is an honest character and a very skilled rider, who looks to have the world at his feet, but he’s done the hard yards and bounced back from a ‘forced’ lay off when he was controversially dropped from the series three years ago. Since that time it has been all systems go for the aggressive Dane and last year he was right in the thick of things toward the end of the year. His 2008 Grand Prix campaign got off to a promising start when he finished third in Krsko. However, his fortunes took a surprising nose-dive in the second round at Leszno when he struggled to a six-point score. Such a result was totally unacceptable to the ambitious Dane, and he immediately set about making a switch from Jawa to GM engines before the Swedish Grand Prix in Gothenburg a fortnight later. However, the centre piece of Hans Andersen's performance in Gothenburg was his awkward and sudden tumble on the final lap of Heat 14.
He had been chasing Krzysztof Kasprzak for second and had finally overhauled the Pole on the last lap. Hans was defending his position on the final corner, when he hit one of the ruts in the surface and was violently flung off his machine. He was also thankful that after the disappointment of Leszno he took the opportunity to renew some of his equipment, most importantly a new crash helmet, changing from Bell to Arai. "The meeting didn't particularly go that well towards the second half of the meeting, and the track did unfortunately cut up in some ways, and it also played a part in that big crash," he says seriously.
"The crash was very similar to the one the year before in Germany where I knocked myself out. I had a crash in England before the Leszno GP when the bike went over the fence and I hit my head - and I didn't feel good," he says with a chuckle. "After Leszno I decided that I would change my helmet because I had used Bell for three years and I'd banged my head too many times. So I was glad that they worked, so I didn't hurt myself more than I did. But that crash killed my momentum in that meeting. "It started fairly good and it looked as though we were set for a good night, but then the track played its part. These are the best 15 riders in the world, and when they keep crashing in every race then something has got to be wrong." The Gothenburg round was more like a crash-athon instead of a SGP. Whether it was speedway or not is debatable, but what was clear was the surface couldn't hold up to the rigours of racing. Unfortunately, there were similar occurrences in the British round in Cardiff and several stars complained about the track. Is Hans a supporter of big stadium speedway? "Yes and no. It's superb when they get the tracks race-able. There are some fantastic venues to go to: Cardiff and Copenhagen.
I don't know why, but Copenhagen never seems to be a problem, the conditions seem to be spot on and they get it right there. And the track is actually enjoyable to race, the surroundings and the atmosphere, it's phenomenal. "Cardiff is also good, but the track seems to play its part every year. I'd say that the track last year was the worst that it has ever been, because people were crashing going across the start/finish line," he recalls. "I think it would be a shame if they were to lose a venue like Cardiff, but at the end of the day they've got to get it right otherwise someone is going to get really, really hurt one day." When we get to discussing the disaster that was the German GP in Gelsenkirchen, which was one of the series' biggest embarrassments, he doesn't have much to say on the matter other than: "I don't know what was going on there - it's as if it wasn't meant to be." While he may not want to be drawn on the German GP's postponement, he has plenty to say about the organiser's choice of Bydgoszcz for the final re-arranged round.
"I thought it made a mockery of the whole thing and made the World Championship look stupid in my opinion," he says frankly. "It's not the fact that we went to Bydgoszcz so much, it's just that in the previous GP we should have rode in Gelsenkirchen, then we went to Italy before that, then before that we were at Bydgoszcz, so it was only five weeks ago that we were there! "It doesn't matter how good you are, Gollob is so much better than anyone, ever, to ride around that track. I didn't have a problem going to Poland I just thought that we should have gone to Wroclaw or a neutral track. To go to the same track, twice in a season, within five weeks, I thought it was ridiculous. "There was so much at stake at stage of the season as well: the fight for gold, the fight for bronze, the fight for the top eight, the Super Prix, everything, and they made Bydgoszcz the choice and they took away all the excitement when they announced that Bydgoszcz was the track that we had to go and ride at. Nothing happened that you didn't expect to happen," he says.
As he mentioned, there was also the Super Prix to be decided as well, and with the gate positions already pre-determined, it was no surprise that Gollob walked off with the biggest share of US$200,000 prize fund. Hans is also critical of the Super Prix, believing that the money could have been used more wisely. "It's another race, it can be exciting for the fans," he acknowledges, "but I think it's wrong that one rider should have a chance of earning that amount of money. At the end of the day we're racing for the World Championship and that's what we're there for. "You don't earn a lot of money riding in the GPs, so I think all that money should have been put into one big pot and the riders should have had a bit extra instead. Not a lot of riders make money out of the GP, they ride for personal pride and they have ambitions to be World Champion. For the midfield downward, it costs them a lot of money to ride in the series so I think it would be good for them not to have this Super Prix and they could have more money." The 'dash for the cash' didn't meet with the approval of some of the sport's purists either, who felt it was nothing more than a sideshow to the main event of winning the world title. Andersen says that qualifying or winning the Super Prix never entered his head at any of the designated rounds. "I didn't think at the GPs in Cardiff and Copenhagen, 'if I win it I'll get into the Super Prix,' it didn't cross my mind. I was still racing to get on the rostrum on the World Championship. "In some ways it was nice for Rune Holta because he won in Gothenburg and he was in the Super Prix race and had a chance of winning. To be fair to Rune, I don't think he's ever going to be World Champion, but he had the chance of doing something else. I'd prefer all that money was split between all the riders." Money, or the lack of it, has always been a contentious issue among the riders. Even during the period when the series seemed particularly prosperous there was one regular competitor who had to sleep in his van because he couldn't afford a bed for the night. "With everything that's why the riders were trying to get a riders association together to give us a voice," Hans says.
"The problem is that people just can't seem to work together, some riders can work together, but others just don't have the foresight to see that what we say is not only good for us, but also for them as well." Hans eventually finished his 2008 World Championship season in fifth place with 140 points, and also picked up his first Grand Prix victory in Italy since his 'man on a mission' year in 2006 - a win that he felt was on its way. "I definitely felt that I had a win coming for a long time," he says. "At Eskilstuna (2007) I was leading until the final lap, I made a mistake and Leigh (Adams) passed me. Even at Malilla, Adams passed me again due to another rider's mistake. I got second in Prague; I finished second at Bydgoszcz as well, but I made six out of the 11 finals which was okay because it's going in the right way. I've been pushing for a win for a long time. "I know we had a bit of luck, but at the end of the day you have to have a bit of luck to win at any sport. At other times I've had bad luck when I've been leading races and it's been stopped and losing out in the re-runs. The best is yet come," he adds. During one of his guest appearances on Sky Sports, former world number 3, Chris Louis, once described Hans Andersen as 'Honest Hans'. And that's a fair assessment of the Dane who is not afraid to voice his opinion, but refrains from being outspoken.
However, like his fellow countryman Nicki Pedersen, he has a reputation for being controversial and he hasn't been the most popular of racers among British fans. At the World Cup Final at Reading Andersen was involved in a controversial incident with Chris Harris. There were plenty who felt that the Dane overstepped the mark with some of his comments, does he regret any of that and does he still believe Bomber laid down his machine? "All I'll say is that he definitely didn't crash because I went by him," he says and adds: "I wouldn't say that I regret those comments because I was within my rights to say what I said.
It was one of those things and things happen. "We (Denmark) were leading from fairly early on and it looked like we were going to win when the referee and other things suddenly went against us. It doesn't do the sport any good at these big meetings when you have a referee that can hardly speak any English," he says. "At some GPs the referee has ruined the meetings, especially at Cardiff, but at World Championship events where there is so much at stake, maybe there should be two refs, or at least someone else who has a say. In football they have one referee, but he gets help from both the linesmen as well." Returning to the World Cup at Reading he continues: "We had a good team talk and said 'well, we cannot let this slip', and we got into gear and won it. We had the potential with this young team ever since 2002 when we came second at Peterborough to win the World Cup. But we'd just been lacking experience and consistency." Andersen has also experienced a less-than-friendly rivalry with Scott Nicholls over the years - a coming together at Malilla in 2007 seemed to illustrate that the hatchet hadn't been buried that deeply. "The media has blown it out of proportion," Andersen says of the rivalry. "I've never had a problem with him, I was happy to join Ipswich when he was there, and I thought we were going to have a good team. I can speak to him with no problem, we don't have to send each other Christmas cards, but it does make it easier if you can get along because of the amount of travelling. You can become lonely very quickly if you don't get along. "The media loved it didn't they?
The same thing happened with me and Nicki the same year, the Danish media just went on and on with it. It's always good to get stories, but at some stage I think you should only get stories for what you're doing on the track, not because someone is giving you a hard time." During the eighties, Denmark was the dominant speedway nation winning six successive world team titles. One of the leading riders of that era was triple World Champion, Erik Gundersen. The former Cradley rider inspired Hans to become a speedway rider and he paid homage to his hero by changing his livery to the same colours as Gundersen's. "The retro look and everything came about fairly quick, it's was something that I wanted to do at the beginning of the season, but when it came to ordering all the bits and pieces I thought it was easier to order the same everywhere," Hans explains. "After that crash in Gothenburg I had to buy a new front wheel anyway, gold or silver, it didn't really make any difference. We had a set of guards made and it looked really good and then we asked people to make the suits within a week - and they did. "These are the colours that Erik rode in and also the colours that I started myself with. I had the same colour bikes and everything the first year that I came to Poole.
It was only the following year that I changed the colours. "I watched Erik when I was three years old, when he won his first World Championship, and I told my dad that I wanted to be a speedway rider," he recalls. "He thought it was great because my dad had always been a big speedway fan, but he could never afford to ride himself. So for me to tell him I wanted to be a speedway rider, well I had his full support! "It carried on for about another year of me asking my dad if I could be a speedway rider. Then one day, at the age of four, he bought me a bike. I could ride a bike no problem, but every time I went on a push bike I had to have stabilisers on it, but I could easily ride this motocross bike all round the garden and everywhere!" Hans has a determined and robust style of racing that copes well with the often merciless style that's seen in the World Championship series. "Riders tend to get 10 per cent better when they're racing in the GPs," Hans believes. "On a league basis you're only riding against one or two opponents, not knocking league racing, but it's usually just one rider and maybe his partner. In the GPs you're riding against three really good riders." As the 2009 Grand Prix series beckons, many people are expecting the destiny of this year's crown to be between Nicki Pedersen and Jason Crump. Nevertheless, Andersen showed last year that he's on the verge of mounting a strong challenge for this year's individual title. "I know I've got the ability, the bikes and the people around me, so we can do it," he says confidently. "The target this year is to get on that rostrum and challenge for the title. Anything less would be a disappointment. They won't be looking over their shoulder for me, they'll be looking ahead."
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Hans Andersen in action - Photo by Mike Patrick
