I road raced a fair bit when I was in my 20s. And I know that if I had listened to my mate and gone racing with him in Europe, I would have raced on the IOM. These days I watch some of the on-board video of the IOM, and one of the things which really strikes me, is how difficult it must be to learn where every corner goes, before you would crash yourself. How would you ever force yourself to go slow enough to learn the circuit before you started going fast ? And even then you would have to cope with any machinery problems. I think that if I had ever gone there, I would probably have returned to Australia in an urn. Even on short circuits, you need to be very familiar with them before you can become fast enough to be competitive. When you race, you know the risks and if they are excessive, you need to back off. However you cannot put an old head on young shoulders.
