Annual bike shindig The Bike Show is to move from its long-time home at Birmingham’s NEC for 2005. The show’s upping sticks and relocating to Stoneleigh Park near Coventry. Which won’t make all that much difference for travelling, it’s only about fifteen minutes away.

We suspect that the main reason for the move is cost – try to book the NEC for the eighth year of a known popular show and watch the rates go through the roof. But that said, Stoneleigh looks like a good venue for a bike show, and we’ve thought for the last couple of years that the NEC halls are either too small or too big for The Bike Show. As well as the smart-looking exhibition hall there’s plenty of space outside (usually used for clay pigeon shooting, kart racing and all sorts of other things – ferret racing, anyone?) giving plenty of scope for 4X, dirt jumps and BMX street stuff. The extensive road network in the park will be brought into play for the Bike Show Circuit Cup road race, too, with plenty of opportunity for a longer and more exciting course than the NEC could offer.

The inside bits of the show will be split between the two halls. The first will contain manufacturers (mountain and road), holiday companies, tourist organisations and the trials arena. The second will contain the BMX halfpipe, BMX exhibitors and the ever-popular retail section.

Splitting the show up like this looks like a smart move. Lots of people go to this show to buy stuff, but people who want to look at things don’t like the hustle and bustle of the retail areas. Stick ’em in two separate halls and if you want to completely ignore “the other side” then it’ll be easy to do so.

The dates are 1-3 April 2005 – keep an eye on www.thebikeshow.com for further details. And you can check out Stoneleigh Park at www.stoneleighpark.com – we’ve had an amble around the virtual tour and can confirm that there’s plenty of space and the gents’ loos are clean…