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If I was faced with this situation, rather than the nuclear option I would be thinking along the following lines: Blue Badges would need to be registered with the Club in advance, by sending a copy of the front and back of the badge together with another piece of ID (copy of passport or driving licence) and the vehicle registration number to be used. Each applicant would be issued with a Blue Badge parking permit, together with an information sheet which would lay out in clear language the ground rules: • Speed limit of 10mph on the Showground • A clear diagram of exactly where the allocated parking area is • Unequivocal instructions that should any steward be abused or the vehicle parked inappropriately the parking permit would be immediately withdrawn (if the rules are simple and clear I see no need for a ‘second chance’). The majority of Blue Badge holders will be season ticket holders and I would consider making that a requirement of the permit to ease congestion and admin at the vehicle gate. For casual and visiting fans I would provide a dedicated email address where the visitor would email 48 hours before a meeting the information required (Blue Badge number and holder’s name, and vehicle registration number), these applicants would receive a return email authorising parking to produce at the vehicle gate along with the Blue Badge. I appreciate that such a system would exclude the genuine impulse visitor, but would cater more compassionately for the regular fans.

If your post is a pathetic attempt at taking some kind of moral high ground then its just that, pathetic. The passing of Danny Ayres is a tragedy and we as fans have paid our respects by posting messages of condolence on here and other parts of social media, of course there will be other on here closer to the Ayres family who have paid their tributes personally. My post was a perfectly reasonable answer to a perfectly reasonable question posted the other day. How ever hard, the management at both Scunthorpe and Ipswich will need to sign a rider, when that will happen of course is up to each club.

I think one meeting is more than enough to honour Danny, I get the idea of a home leg each and the amount of money it can raise but there are still meeting costs, rider availability, mechanical costs, potential for rider injury etc. I think a one-off meeting is perfect, if ran annually it can help his children overtime rather than just a one-off

Newcastle, like a lot of other tracks, can't afford or not have enough riders to complete a complete season in the NL. I was looking last year at the possibilities of a NL team based on Newcastle/Redcar with shared home meetings, but the only NL track near to us was Belle Vue, which is 140 miles across the country. With the possibility of closure of Newcastle suddenly, we were resurrected by Rob Grant, but Edinburgh have now decided to enter the NL this year and they now have the Northern riders who wanted to ride NL. Rob obviously wanted an outlet for what riders we have, and a small venture in the NT seems like the perfect opportunity to test the NL water. Remember he has had a massive job on to get the Diamonds/Gems/Sapphires set up and running from the available riders, plus some new riders to the UK. As well as Wallinger, the NT will give both assets Josh Embleton and Joe Adcock a chance to show their skills having not been picked up in the declared NL teams. Newcastle will be back in the NJL this season with the Sapphires to defend the league title the Gems won last year The double headers will start earlier on the Sunday afternoon and the admission will be £3 extra. To think you can give the fans two meetings, and not charge extra, shows you don't really have a grip on the finances of running a business.

Michael Green stated in 'The Art of Coarse Golf';- "If you're cheating and still losing, then your opponent is cheating more than you".

A sensible solution which hopefully the club will take on board

So many people in everyday life suffer from mental health.

The problem is that Newcastle do not have enough dates to run a full National League programme but want to have a team racing at that standard to help progress the careers of junior riders. They need a few riders who are experienced at NDL level to help the newer riders. The progression as I see it is NJL, then SDL/MDL and then NDL, Championship and Premiership. The National Trophy was being run this season for the stand alone teams who need more competitive meetings than the NDL can offer and Newcastle are adding extra meetings for those teams which helps the stand alone teams and Newcastle. A win win situation as I see it.

Blimey,,, didn't take long for Crump to be shown the door. Nki,, crump now Lindback,,, who is next,,, we may need to borrow one

I would be prepared to administer such a scheme on behalf of the Club if asked

I can imagine a facility where Danny's race jacket is not used for a month and covered by RR as a mark of respect would be allowed, and even the most anti Godfrey fans surely couldn't find fault in that?

Rusty was the reason I ever started going to speedway I spoke to him one night in town when he first arrived here and he persuaded me to go, that led to me running the track shop for many seasons and fundraising for the club. It also led to some life long friendships who now since closure sadly we may never meet up with again. Supporting the Comets has some amazing memories for me and of course our very last season brought us the trophies we had strived many years to win.

Oval track racing - Simon Wigg, top speedway. longtrack and grasstrack rider over a 23 year career must be the obvious one!

I'm sure Rob and the less bitter, normal speedway supporters, will think nothing of team building until poor Danny Ayres is finally in his resting place.

Let’s hope this rider does not have mental health issues as the constant belittling is likely to play on a conscientious Rider . Keyboard warriors everywhere should try ENCOURAGEMENT..

I’ve hardly been since they’ve been back in the third division but I was a regular at Mildenhall 2006-08 in the Premier League days and some of the racing was superb. It’s a great little track when prepared properly.

That mildy track looked like it was good,,,, would be very happy if the new banking at Foxhall provided racing even half that good. Having said that,,, a lot of good races are often down to who is involved. If for example all races at Foxhall had Ben Howe, loram Louis and Gollob in them,,, most would be good.

That is the following Saturday the 27th

I don’t follow. What does this mean, please?

a bit handy and out of control on occasion

I think with a more competitive field of 15 SGP riders you could & WILL get riders getting into a semi-final with 7 or 8 pts then finishing 2nd in Semi & winning the Final to get 20 pts. An example off the top of my head is Tai in Gorzow. He didn`t win a race in the 20 heats 2nd in semi & finished 3rd in the Grand Final. So on the new system would get 16 pts yet scored about 10/11 actual pts. Looking at the ICE GP so far the Russians have been riding within themselves in the heats to the detriment of the racing knowing they are ok for Semi-Final qualification then going for it in the S/F plus Final. I hope I am wrong with this new system but I can`t see it improving anything. Why change something that doesn`t need fixing!! A more pressing problem in my eyes is the starts!!! To me if there is a false start all 4 should be back to the start-line NO ONE should be allowed on the track & the pit gate should remain closed.

Just asked if I could get a bye to a later round of a snooker tournament if I didn't fancy my opponent, but got told no! If i'm too busy, i'd just have to forfeit. So how did Poole managed it? How can a "professional" sports organisation be more lapse on the rules than an amateur club event?

This was the last time I went to Mildenhall 1989 funnily enough Dave Jackson (Aussie) his sister still owns a hair salon in Felixstowe (I think).

And that (or some of it) was the logical step to the mess they created by not doing it in the first place before going nuclear. Personally I think that the reasons as the club laid out may be part of the problem although they were and are fixable as you say, but there is something else we're not being told IMO although we do know that it's a club problem as the EoES quickly washed their hands of the debacle. I'd just do badge number, name and vehicle registration to be used. Your system is too much data, you're not having all that. You're not gov.uk! I've no intention of buying a season ticket unless they reverted back to the credit card version when I might once again consider it so I'm sure some sort of discrimination would be claimed there. BB holders are, by definition, often not the healthiest and potentially don't want to, or can't financially, commit to a season ticket anyway? Posh make no such requirement on parking: "Peterborough United Football Club has a limited number of disabled persons parking places for home and away fans that are allocated to Blue Badge holders" - they do charge a fiver for convenience but the other option is to pay in the pay car parks anyway. The general premise I fully agree with though.

I did say that about Jens, Grachan. He most certainly had a British wife and was permanently domiciled in Britain. They were regulars at all social events, especially afterf the meetings. No question of dashing off for more important bookings.

Half the Ipswich team were ex- scramblers at one point, as were Arthur Browning , Tom Leadbiter and a few others , including today, riders like Richard Lawson and the Worralls. I can’t think of any that started in Speedway and then moved over to an average standard I scrambling. They are totally different techniques. As a side point though, I remember about 6/7 years ago Peter Karlsson rode in a grass track in Kent , on a bike he borrowed from Paul Hurry. He had never sat on a grass track bike before but proved unbeatable in the heats but unfortunately the meeting was rained off before the Finals. Similarly I once saw Anders Michanek in an end of season grass track at Lydden. He absolutely whopped everybody. I don’t think anybody has mentioned Joe Screen yet. He didn’t particularly concentrate on grass track but used to ride in big money continental meetings , which were not always ovals but some included sweeping right hand bends and jumps . By all accounts he was pretty hot stuff. One thing I forgot to mention about Alf Hagon was that he was also winner of the famous Red Marley Hill Climb which adds to his claim to be top all rounder.

Yep. More so called health and safety issues. Man with some cones is the best bet.

For the 3 disciplines identified in Steve’s original post I would put Simon Wigg no 1, with Kelvin Tatum 2, and Peter Collins 3. If Peter had won long track world championship he would have been more of a contender for the top two. Missing from the list is Chris Morton and Chris Harris. Neither top 3 material but worthy of a mention..

I like him even more now

Many thanks for the guidance HA. You bring out some very valid points. If it was so bad to hire Schroeck why was nobody complaining? Despite the views held by some supporters not all in speedway officialdom are fools. Regarding Commonwealth v EEC riders I'd suggest that the perception was still that the Auissies and Kiwis were 'us' while the Europeans were 'foreigners'. As you say, those with direct British links had patriality, the remainder without rights. I'd say the language and cultural links with the Aussies and Kiwis helped strengthen that view, despite the law. The observation of the slump in BL numbers in the mid-80s is very valid with lot of mediocre Europeans suddenly finding places at a premium. At this point I have a confession to make. I might be to blame, not my erstwhile boss, Ron. I suppose I do have to take some of the blame. When Screen Sport approached KM Video to cover speedway on their new service in 1984 we naturally went for British League racing. However the BSPA believed that doing a deal with us for league racing would conflict with their deal with ITV for World of Sport. Faced with a golden opportunity to put league racing on TV for the first time I argued for coverage of the National League instead. My determined lobbying for my beloved NL won the argument. The NL was semi-detached from the BSPA then and they grabbed at the chance arguing that cable and satellite TV was narrowcasting rather than broadcasting! Suddenly I was in the position to put my decade and a half experience as a fan of an NL team to good use! After the first year of coverage in 1984 several BL tracks started looking at an NL, with a TV contract, that might be a better offer than the BL and we had the first mass switch. I remember Wimbledon manager Cyril Maidment telling me in an interview "We are moving ACROSS, not down". After 1985 the NL was a completely different 'beast' and now a long way from its training origins. It was only later with Rasmussen and Schroeck's signings that the gates opened but by then the places once available for up and coming EEC riders in BL tracks were much reduced and with a pool of talent looking for places the NL was under incredible pressure and temptation to hire them. The NL was changed by the influx of tracks like Wimbledon and Hackneyand the return of Eastbourne and Exeter Okay IT WAS MY FAULT I won't come quietly......

Complete freedom of movement only came with the EU in 1993, at which point the BSPA would have no legal right to restrict EU riders in its competitions. Prior to that, I believe EEC workers had the legal right to employment in another EEC country if it could be demonstrated there were no local workers available who could do the job. So I'd guess the inclusion of Rasmussen was justified on the basis of there not being a suitable local No. 1 available, and of course Rasmussen was already riding in Britain. Peter Shroeck was perhaps a more dubious justification, but it seems the government was more lax about such things in those days and if there wasn't any objection from the BSPA or SRA then perhaps it was just rubber stamped. I never really understood though, why Commonwealth riders were considered morally acceptable in the NL and not European riders. I know many would have had patriality anyway, but there were plenty of Commonwealth riders of dubious quality filling NL teams long before Rasmussen was employed. Of course, the 'opening of the floodgates' coincided with a contraction in the BL down to 9 teams whereby a number of mid-level European riders suddenly became surplus to requirements. Didn't Preben Eriksen and a few others drop down into the NL at the same time from memory? Think it was just a combination of circumstances and economics that led to the influx of Europeans - don't think Ronnie Russell can really be blamed for that, and inevitably the league would have had to fall into line with employment law anyway.

I don't think people realise how much of a divide formed between the BL and NL, although 1975/6 was early. By the mid 80s the NL had its own offices and administration and I believe the split could have gone much further. Having that application in rejected in 1975/6 may have sown the seed.

I heard that too, but with only 3 home & 3 away NT matches, it won't take up much of his time!

If it was my club I'd wait till after the funeral then press on with team plans. As upsetting as losing a rider is, they will eventually have to carry on with the sport!

Uncle Len is partial to an adverse camber bless him.

I really do not see a golf buggy resolving this problem . May help on entry but chaos on exit

Rob stated at the first "fan night" that Nicki had been asked (along with Bjarne and Kenneth Bjerre). It's possible that Nicki has a compulsory polish practice that weekend, since they are rather good at that.

While they were in the same Team ,Sam Jensen rode at No 4 in all his matches Bickley never got out of reserve ,Nicol has a higher average than both of them so will have to ride at 2 or 4. Jensen is replacing Bickley at reserve is my point.On what I saw last season that is a big +.

I beg to differ.

Of course. Another report from the same time actually mentioned Trujillo as 'open champion of Mexico'. remembering that previously Cordy Milne was Champion of Mexico, even though he was a US citizen. But other reports and even ads list Trujillo as being a Mexican which of course we know is wrong, but I guess this was all released by Putt Mossmann as part of his tour promotion....

There's no real benefit to have wider straights IMO. The legal limit is currently 8 metres wide, which is quite adequate to accommodate 4 riders abreast at the starts. Probably the only time they will be in one line in the whole of the race. Far better to concentrate on widening the entrances/exits to the corners, and widening them to give more racing lines especially with some decent banking. There should always be banking on every track.

The straights are narrow this combined with the adverse cambers on the bend exits are causing lots of avoidable crashes....Both need sorting with the addition of more shale..Obviously the higher standard riders will be able to cope better with the problem.if nothing is done....which looks the case..?

That's not the reason I heard Dave but putting that aside, wouldn't you have thought that it might make a little bit of sense to carry the rules through until the end of the season? Any tinkering, amendments or changes can be thought of during the season and brought in for the following season or on a specific date and, not just on a whim.

Was that Burgergate? As I remember the insinuation there was that Wolbert’s food poisoning might have been made up, whereas in 2010 every EL team had an official number eight who could ride as often as the team manager wanted them to which contributed to Pawlicki riding so few meetings. It was a massive loophole and for a change Poole got shafted rather than doing the shafting which I’m sure the vast majority of those watching thoroughly enjoyed

We were blessed with the old fence at Rye. While the introduction of air fences as mandatory has been a revelation at many tracks the old fence at Rye was probably safer for riders in all honesty. It would give on impact and there was then a run off behind it, whereas with an air fence despite a cushion there is still a more sudden stop on impact. There are many incidents that I can recall that would have probably been worse had an air fence been in place. As mentioned in other posts the air fence did also make viewing worse at Rye, we do have to accept the times change however and air fences being mandatory is certainly a positive thing on the whole.

I was there...great day! Razzer was one of my favourites!

Some excellent articles in there this week...Danny Ayres tribute, Swindon track review, English team in 70s and 80s, and big rivalry with Yanks, Lee Ashby feature, Lindgren interview, etc., Good magazine for this minority sport.We should support it.

He likes pie n mash an all Chris Keef

I think there were seven dirty Coventry riders at Poole after the 2010 Elite League Grand Final............

THANKS ... will try