Qualla: Ballaugh Bridge https://qualla.com/ballaugh-bridge en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:16 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/u/ballaugh-bridge-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Ballaugh Bridge https://qualla.com/ballaugh-bridge Ballaugh Bridge: Introduction https://qualla.com/ballaugh-bridge/ Photo credit (talk) (Uploads), CC BY-SA 3.0. Approach Ballaugh Bridge at racing speed and the road simply stops being flat. The hump rises in a sharp arch over the Ravensdale River, and a motorcycle taking it at any reasonable pace leaves the ground entirely - front wheel first, then the bike, then the rider hanging on as the suspension extends fully and the whole machine briefly flies. The photograph of that small leap, taken at the same spot every TT, is one of the iconic images of the Isle of Man TT. The bridge itself looks unremarkable. It is a small humpback stone span on a Manx country road. What it has accumulated, in just over a century, is a racing history denser than that of almost any other piece of public infrastructure in the British Isles.

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Image: (talk) (Uploads) | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/u/ballaugh-bridge-wp/gcsu-ballaugh-bridge-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Ballaugh Bridge: Before the Motorcycles https://qualla.com/ballaugh-bridge/ Photo credit A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. Long before the bikes arrived, the cars came. Ballaugh Bridge formed part of the Highland Course, a 52.15-mile circuit used for early motor racing on the island - amended to 40.38 miles in 1906 - and of the 37.50-mile Four Inch Course used for the 1904 Gordon Bennett Trial and fo...

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Image: A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/u/ballaugh-bridge-wp/gcsu-ballaugh-bridge-before-the-motorcycles.mp3 0:06 2 full Ballaugh Bridge: 1911 and the Mountain Course https://qualla.com/ballaugh-bridge/ Photo credit A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. In 1911, the Auto-Cycling Union adopted the Four Inch Course for the Isle of Man TT motor-cycle races. Ballaugh Bridge was inside the route. That same course - or rather, what it has evolved into - is now the 37.73-mile Isle of Man TT Mountain Course, used continuously for the TT...

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Image: A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/u/ballaugh-bridge-wp/gcsu-ballaugh-bridge-1911-and-the-mountain-course.mp3 0:06 3 full Ballaugh Bridge: 1953 and the Last Humpback https://qualla.com/ballaugh-bridge/ Photo credit A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. The bridge has not survived unchanged. Over the winter of 1953-1954, in preparation for the 1954 TT, the road was widened and the bridge profile altered. The garden wall of the adjacent Ballaugh Railway Hotel - now the Raven Hotel, named for the river - was removed to give racing...

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Image: A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/u/ballaugh-bridge-wp/gcsu-ballaugh-bridge-1953-and-the-last-humpback.mp3 0:06 4 full Ballaugh Bridge: Karl Gall's Roadside https://qualla.com/ballaugh-bridge/ Photo credit A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. Just by the bridge stands a small memorial to Karl Gall, an Austrian motorcycle racer who was part of the pre-war BMW works team. During evening practice for the 1939 Isle of Man TT, Gall crashed near the bridge and died from his injuries. The roadside marker remembers him by nam...

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Image: A.G.Jones / Agljones at en.wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/u/ballaugh-bridge-wp/gcsu-ballaugh-bridge-karl-galls-roadside.mp3 0:06 5 full