World Sidecar champions Ben and Tom Birchall from Mansfield are on the shortlist for an award from Nottinghamshire County Council.
The category is Team of the Year and last year was won by the Nova Centurion Women’s 4 x 200m freestyle relay team which included Rebecca Adlington.
This year’s Sports Review of the Year will take place on Friday, February 5 at the East Midlands Conference Centre on the campus of the University of Nottingham. Nearly five hundred people will gather to celebrate our athletes, administrators, coaches, and officials in Nottinghamshire sport in another remarkable year for the county.
BBC East Midlands Today presenters Colin Hazelden and Natalie Jackson will host the evening joined by guests from professional sport including Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club’s Mick Newell as well as players from the Nottingham Panthers and Nottingham Rugby Clubs. The finalists and winners will be announced from a long list of 5 nominees – all of which were invited to attend this glittering evening of celebration.
The Mitchells of Mansfield supported brothers were also featured on Simon Mayo’s BBC Radio 2 programme on Friday night after Ben was contacted to give an insight into the sport of sidecar racing.
The programme is featuring a different sport each week and is concentrating on the sports that although are very popular do not receive the same coverage in the media as major sporting events such as football.
Sports presenter Matt Williams contacted Ben who was in Switzerland at the time collecting his new F1 chassis and asked – live on air – how he managed to fund his sport. Ben replied that he had some very supportive sponsors backing the team and the rest was self funded.
Ben and Tom will spend the next few weeks preparing the new LCR chassis and Yamaha R1 engine to be ready to begin a series of tests ahead of their first race of the new campaign.
The first round of the Battle of Britain F1 Sidecar championship is scheduled for Pembrey on April 10 prior to the team travelling to Le Mans in France to begin the defence of their world title on April 18.
