I'm extremely lucky I was able to attend in 2018. A friend was going with a group of people from our NATO base, and one guy bailed about 6 weeks before the TT. My friend came by my office and asked if I wanted to go. Best €900 I spent while stationed in Europe! The Assen GP was second (Rossi's last win).
"Real" road racing like the TT, NW200, Ulster GP and the rest of the Irish series is the most spectacular and fastest bike racing on the planet. Unfortunately , it is deadly and getting deadlier as bikes get faster. For Speedy, just some of the riders killed 2017-2019: William Dunlop, James Cowton, Dan Kneen, Malachi Mitchel Thomas, Alan Bonner, Jamie Hamilton, Gavin Lupton, Adam Lyon, Dan Heggarty, Daily Matheson, Darren Keys and that is just the top riders, several novice riders also killed.
I'm glad I spent the money and time and went in 2014. I still want to get back over there again. The TT races are too ingrained in the Islands history and culture for them to let a couple years of cancellations due to the pandemic prevent it from happening again. When it does happen again it will probably be the biggest attendance in history.
The attendance at the IOM TT from outside the island spectators is not as big as you might think. From my search for the last 20 years total for the two weeks outside spectators was 35-40k with talk of 45k in big years like 2000. So most IOM spectators you see are locals. I now worry about all of these "bucket listers" showing up in June 2022, I wanted to go then too! Going to get very expensive now.
Visordown: ‘Shocked’ John McGuinness hints at retirement after 2021 Isle of Man TT axe. https://www.visordown.com/news/raci...s-hints-retirement-after-2021-isle-man-tt-axe