NEXT YEAR'S South African round of the World Superbike Championship is under threat due to a mismanagement of funds and circuit safety, despite promoters paying over £35million to host the world-class event.

Following an investigation by the country's award-winning news channel 'Carte Blanche', one of South Africa's top motorsports officials and a noted sports promoter have both disclosed the world-clas motorcycle event is in turmoil, even though it's still scheduled to go ahead on May 16th 2010, according to next year's official WSBK calendar.

Carte Blanche News Channel reports that Selwyn Nathan, CEO of sports promoters 'Knightsbridge' was paid over R55-million (£4million) to secure a selection of high-end motorsports events for the country - including the WSB races at Kyalami.

Nathan explains how he sealed the WSB deal: "...we saw the Flamminis ...(the brothers that own the Superbike series). And then the game was on, the game was on. The decision... the negotiations went on for a few weeks or a month and we pulled and pushed, negotiated and did everything we can to get the best deal..."

Nathan goes on to explain he negotiated to pay R444-million to host the Superbikes and Superstars (V8 car racing series) at Kyalami. That's over £35million of South Africa's taxpayers' money.

On the back of Nathan's admission, Carte Blanche interviewed the sport's regulatory body, Motorsport South Africa. Their Chairman, Roger Pearce, explained WSB won't be returning to Kyalami until major revisions to the circuit have been made. The track is scheduled to run next year's WSB races on 16th May.

Pearce: "The A1 and the Superbike can't come back here again until more money is spent on the circuit. There were some changes made to it which weren't completed and we were lucky to have them here, but they cannot come back again until we've fixed a few corners at Kyalami."
                                                                                                                                                                             

Kyalami,my old favorite SA racing track for cars and bikes.This era came to a dead stop when Peter Revson tragically died following a fatal head injury in the early 70's due to a young over eager track martial and his fire extinguisher,sadly corruption and bribery has become the real deal over there in recent years..they do still have the track in Welkom where a WSB meeting was held a few years back and another in Pretoria called Zwartkops which is regularly used for local meetings. Kyalami is used today mostly by auto manufacturers and car mag's for test drives,econo drives and photo shoots...the north eastern side of the track is a highly populated business centre and close to the south western side is a large off road track for 4x4 quads and dirt bikes .I loved the old Kyalami track atmosphere it was great! btw last year in May the WSB races were still held there the weekend i left SA.