Rune Holta (born 29 August 1973 in

Stavanger Stavanger, officially the Stavanger Municipality, is a city and municipalities of Norway, municipality in Norway. It is the third largest city and third largest metropolitan area in Norway (through conurbation with neighboring Sandnes) and the ...

, Norway) is a

speedway Speedway may refer to: Racing Race tracks *Daytona International Speedway, a race track in Daytona Beach, Florida. *Edmonton International Speedway, also known as Speedway Park, a former motor raceway in Edmonton, Alberta. *Indianapolis Motor Spe ...

rider. He grew up in Randaberg, Norway, but has been a Polish citizen since 2002.

Career

In 1994, Holta finished runner-up to Mikael Karlsson in the final of the 1994 Speedway Under-21 World Championship following a run-off for the title. This was the same year that Holta won the first of his four

Norwegian Individual Speedway Championship The Individual Speedway Norwegian Championship is an annual speedway event held each year organised by the Norges Motorsportforbund (NMF). The first championship was held in 1938 in Trondheim and saw Ragnar C. Erichsen as winner. History ...

s. In 2002, he took Polish citizenship, allowing him to represent

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

in international competitions and was a member of their

Speedway World Cup The Speedway World Cup is a motorcycle speedway event for national teams held in different countries. The first edition of the competition in the current format was held in 2001 and replaced the old Speedway World Team Cup, World Team Cup which ...

winning teams in 2005, 2007 and 2010. He has also won the Polish Championship in 2003 and 2007. In 2020, he rode for

Dackarna Dackarna is a motorcycle speedway club from Målilla in Sweden who compete in the Swedish Elitserien. Their home track since 1993 has been the Skrotfrag Arena which was the venue for the Grand Prix of Scandinavia and is the current venue for ...

Malilla in the Swedish Elit League and for

Włókniarz Częstochowa Włókniarz Częstochowa is a motorcycle speedway team based in Częstochowa, Poland. They were established in 1946 and the team's home track is at the Arena Częstochowa, which has a capacity of over 16,850 people. The team currently competes ...

in the Polish Ekstraliga. In 2022, he helped PSŻ Poznań win the 2022 2.Liga.

Awards

For his sport achievements, he received:
Golden Cross of Merit in 2007.

Plane crash

In 2007 Holta survived a plane crash with fellow rider

Tomasz Gollob Tomasz Robert Gollob (; born 11 April 1971 in Bydgoszcz, Poland) is a former Polish motorcycle speedway rider. He appeared in every Speedway Grand Prix series between its inaugural season in 1995 and 2013. He earned 52 caps for the Poland nati ...

. The plane, flown by Władysław Gollob, crashed on the way to a meeting at

Tarnów Tarnów () is a city in southeastern Poland with 105,922 inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of 269,000 inhabitants. The city is situated in the Lesser Poland Voivodeship. It is a major rail junction, located on the strategic east– ...

. Holta escaped with cuts and bruises. On his official website, Holta stated ''"In spite of the circumstance I'm doing OK but I'm very shaken. We have been very lucky, and I'm just glad that I'm still alive."''

Major results

Speedway Grand Prix

References