Reidar Eide

Reidar Eide
Born (1940-11-06)6 November 1940
Høyland, Norway
Died February 1999 (aged 58)
Nationality Norway
Career history
1966-1967 Edinburgh Monarchs
1968-1969 Coatbridge Monarchs
1970 Wembley Lions
1971 Poole Pirates
1972 Sheffield Tigers
1973-1975 Newport
1976-1977 Leicester Lions
1978 Exeter Falcons
1979-1980 Reading Racers
1980 Wolverhampton Wolves
1980 Swindon Robins
Individual honours
1967, 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971 Norwegian Champion
1968 Nordic Champion
1969 Scottish Open Champion
Team honours
1974, 1975, 1978 Spring Gold Cup Winner

Reidar Eide (6 November 1940 – February 1999) was a Norwegian motorcycle speedway rider who was champion of Norway on five occasions.

Biography

Born in Høyland, Eide took up speedway in 1957.[1] He rode for Stavanger in 1960 and made his British League debut in 1966 for Edinburgh Monarchs, and during his career also rode in several other countries including Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, West Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland.[1] In 1967 he averaged 8.99 points per match, scoring seven full maximum scores and averaged just over 9 in 1968.[1] In 1969, for Coatbridge Monarchs, he averaged over 10.[1] Gaining a reputation for being difficult to deal with, over the next three seasons he moved on to Wembley Lions, Poole Pirates, and Sheffield Tigers, before signing for Newport Wasps in 1973.[1][2] He maintained his high scoring for Newport, averaging over 9 in the 1973, 74 and 75 league seasons.[1] In 1976 he moved on to Leicester Lions, averaging over 7.5 before a broken leg ended his season.[3] The following season, lacking fitness, his level of performance had dropped, taking seven rides to score his first point, and only averaging just over 3 points from six matches. In 1978 he moved on to Exeter Falcons, where he once again showed his true form, before moving on to Reading Racers the following year. In 1980, his last year in British speedway, he rode for Reading, Wolverhampton Wolves, Swindon Robins, and one match for Eastbourne Eagles.

Eide won the Norwegian Championship for five successive years between 1967 and 1971, and won the Nordic Championship in 1972.[1] He finished in thirteenth place in the 1968 World Championship Final, and finished fifth (with Dag Lövaas) in the 1973 World Pairs final.[1] He represented Norway and a combined Norway/Denmark team in international matches between 1969 and 1973.[1]

Eide also skied competitively, representing Sandnes IL.[1]

After speedway, Eide became a pig farmer.[2] He died in February 1999 from brucellosis.[2]

World final appearances

Individual World Championship

World Pairs Championship

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Oakes, Peter & Mauger, Ivan (1976) Who's Who of World Speedway, Studio Publications, ISBN 0-904584-04-6, p. 185-6
  2. 1 2 3 Radford, Bob (2009) "Top Reidar", Backtrack, Issue 32 (May–June 2009), p. 24-5
  3. ↑ Jones, Alan (2010) Speedway in Leicester: The Lions Roar, Automedia, p. 163-4
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.