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And I understand that you have your views BUT the NHS was not mentioned in the statement. You chose to bring it up, because it suits your arguments that are massively well documented on another thread (which you are totally entitled to do) My point was by linking it to the NHS you were covertly implying that because the NHS is not snowed under (your view) it's OK to break the Forestry Commission rules. Sadly symptomatic of many nowadays. The rules only apply if they want them to. My view and I'm sticking to it

So motorcyclists should be free to do as they please whenever they see fit. Other people's rules don't apply to them? Whilst there's a killer on the streets, all lesser crimes are still excusable? I'm assuming that the ACU's post relating to Forestry Commission land is aimed more at the trials / MX etc riders? Still, the rules is the rules. The riders can't say they've not been warned. If they can't obey a simple rule like this then what chance do they have of complying with the SCB Speedway Regulations?

Doesn't matter a jot. The reason is, it is Forestry Commission and/or private land and they make the rules. They have decreed for whatever reason they don't want bikes ridden on their land. What part of that don't you understand.

Tonight's meeting definitely on

FULL WEBSITE LATEST NEWS LATEST EVENTS Illegal Riding – Zero Tolerance Despite the current lockdown, some people are choosing to flout the rules and risk the future of our sport by illegally utilising Forestry Commission land and private venues. Illegal activity on Forestry Commission land is a criminal offence and puts all legitimate events at risk. The ACU take a zero tolerance approach to this in partnership with the Forestry Commission, and local police. Anyone caught illegally riding on Forestry Commission Land can expect: - Your bike WILL be impounded under Section 59 by the Forestry Commission and Police. - You WILL be prosecuted for a criminal act by the police. - You WILL be reported to ACU/ AMCA Head Office for a termination of your competition licence. This will be shared with all authorising bodies. If you have any information, you are encouraged to contact the police through 101. Please share this post to ensure the message gets far and wide.

very enjoyable

Well your beloved government says otherwise.. so are you now saying they are lying?

Cardiff university website has an accomodation section, you contact them through this and they email you the link for booking, Cheapest rooms are shared bathroom for a couple of quid more you get ensuite Heather12 i've PM'd you . If you still follow an active team or TBH an inactive one i can pretty much bet that you know someone who stays there or has stayed there. I booked for 18 people back in 2013 and we bumped into another 20 odd from Oxford staying on the same campus

They didn't this year, I booked with a cancellation option as soon as it was announced they tried to charge me up front and when I complained they agreed I had booked before they changed their conditions and I got a refund and I cancel free of charge once it has been cancelled officialy

And this has got what to do with Newcastle?

Without a doubt. He was also a level above Rikardsson in league speedway.

I ignored him

Of course, getting Todd AND Ray at the same time was fantastic! That was a great time in our history, and I even flew up to Glasgow to see us win...

To be honest I agree with the ACU's stance on this, having been in the unfortunate position of having bikes stolen in the past. I doubt reporting such activities with have much effect though, as in many areas youths can be seen riding illegally on clearly stolen motorcycles / mopeds on roads, footpaths and across school fields and little or no action is taken by the fuzz....

True - The ones in outlying areas were panicked into expanding way beyond what was necessary early doors as no one wanted to listen to the info re who was genuinely at risk. Now they've got themselves in a tangle of being too cautious to convert units back to their original usage as still even now the guidance they are getting is muddled at best..

That's a bit sweeping. Many are most definitely not.

I don't expect you to be an avid reader of my posts elsewhere but I regularly object to many of the irrational, ill-informed, intellectually suspect and often down right fictional comments aka lies, about the BSPA etc, on the forum. At the same time I have total respect for constructive posters, even if I disagree with their points of view. However it did seem an easy cop out at the time to blame all the ills of the sport here on not having a British World Champion (or one riding in the BL) . To me it was an excuse to just do nothing . We were in a bar in Wroclaw after Gary's victory and joined by the Valsarna team for a few drinks. Their manager told me how wonderful things would be for the whole sport with a British World Champion as the promoters would now really get the sport back to the top. I implied it was possibly a bad result, other than I was so pleased for Gary, as there had never been a plan and different excuses would now have to be found to continue to not do anything.

Oh, I didn't realise you were a local! Yeah, we played at the Duke for many years; one of the few pubs where we played that's still standing...

Another day looking out the window every 15 minutes to see if tonight’s meeting will go ahead.Just another Sunday. Stay Safe#

Wheels? I remember those days, I think the 4TT, 16 lapper and Pride of the East were the three speedway offerings of the year with the other weeks filled with various moto cross, road racing and other bits and pieces.

I obviously saw a lot of Todd when he returned to Britain (after a year in Germany) and signed for "The Cheetahs" in 1998. I know that I'll upset Rob but I was never a great fan of Todd at Cowley...seemed just the one pace type of rider. Okay when he gated but easily picked off on occasions. I know that he was hero worshipped at Wimbledon and later at Reading but perhaps the bad injury he picked up which forced his premature retirement changed his outlook on his comeback? Just my opinion on observations based as a "Cheetah".

Which sort of brings me to another rider. The one U21 final I attended at Canterbury was when Havelock won with Andy Silver 2nd and Darren Sumner 3rd. He then went on to win the year after , but didn’t really fulfill the early promise and got out of the sport relatively quickly. But it was a great period for England with Loram and Smudger etc

When New Cross raced Belle Vue on 25 June 1947, Van Praag beat Langton in Heat Three. It was the only time they met that night. They met again on 16 July when again Van Praag beat Langton (Heat 11). They met for a third time at New Cross on 13 August, with Van Praag beating Langton yet again (Heat Seven). So 3-0 to Van Praag.

Come on guys-even I know this -Frank Varey , the great promoter at Sheffield who always made sure the track was as smooth as silk and a great racing surface. God bless him.

If you can't gate, you won't be regularly competitive at the top top level, unless you are a once in a generation talent like Gollob or Peter Collins.

I've mentioned 76 but I've got to talk about 2 other years. 1980. After finishing bottom in 79 and making just one change in Roman Jankowski for Bobby McNeil we were slaughtered by King's Lynn 20-57 in the early season gold cup. I think that result gave us the kick up the backside we needed. We had a great year with Bo Petersen topping the national averages for most of the season, before eventually finishing fourth. Losing at home to Cradley in early October ended our title challenge, but after being used to finishing near the bottom of the table it was was great to hit the heights and finish second to Reading. I've got to mention 'the year of the Kestrel.' 1988, what a year, two draws and two defeats both by 47-49. Winning both legs of the London KO Cup. An all British team. Captain fantastic Andy Galvin team-riding Chris Louis home for so many 5-1's. Cheering on Loramski to the British U-21 title at Eastbourne at the grand old age of 17...that's when I knew he was a future world champion.

I always felt that Andy Smith was underrated. Ok he never did much in the gp's but he always used to qualify through the challenge, ahead of such riders as Ermolenko and Crump. He never had to rely on any wild cards. 3 consecutive British Championships-when it was still a strong line-up-confirms his quality. I remember Tony Rickardsson saying something along the lines of "I don't care if I'm racing Jason Crump or Andy Smith, I still want to beat them." Which I thought was a bit disrespectful.

I thought it was a terrible decision by the ref not to award Plech the win or at worst a rerun after he was clearly knocked off by the Russian. Nielsen and Ermolenko should both have been excluded in my eyes in 86 and 93..I still regard Ermolenko as the luckiest world champion ever. In my opinion Szczakiel and Muller were worthy world champions. I should add I don't mean when Sam was clearly knocked off by Hans. I mean when he stopped in the rerun and was hit by Hamill. I don't know what the ref was looking at!

I assume the main issue is that if they crash, it impacts on the health system capacity?

Even if it's the top two leagues UK will have to build a series that stands on it's own. If Poland is where the money is in the top 2 tiers then nothing can be done riders will go where the money is and the UK will either help them get there or see them on their way back down the ladder.

And I didn't want to quote your whole post(Mr Ore) but I agree 100%. Nothing worse than the coverage of the Olympics in my book, where coverage of seemingly every event is so GB biased. I sort of understand it but it gets to the point where coverage of events with no GB interest gets forgotten. Going back to Speedway and the 1983 Final, it's true that British Speedway was in a trough as the country struggled. I seem to recall a lot of comment in the Speedway Star that the 1983 season had been affected by the lack of a World Champion plying their trade and a repeat in 1984 would be another big blow for the domestic product. Then there were comments like these in Peter Oakes post Norden report. Alongside respect for Egon's achievement there was " he will in the days and weeks ahead be labelled the champ who buckled on the title belt because the track was tailor made for his own particular ability" " there were even pit whispers that HE commanded the interval work". Then Billy Sanders...."I know I'm a better speedway rider than him - how's the sport going to benefit?" and finally Bob Radford "a general feeling.....he isn't the World Champion that Speedway needs"

Len said the same thing about Les Collins when Brucie won in 82!

A good spoof was the Only a game programme where they took the p out of the English attitude by doing a commentary of the 1974 World Cup final where the commentator just talked about the English referee Jack Taylor and didn’t mention the foreigners

There was a statement from Len Silver at the time, saying that Billy Sanders should be awarded the title, because he rode in Britain, whilst Egon didn't. In the words of Dizzy Rascal; Bonkers. Egon turned up for an indoor meeting at Wembley and was booed by maybe a couple of hundred moronic Brits for no reason at all. Brilliantly he took to the mike and speaking in perfect English, politely questioned their irrational negativity, which of course none of them had the balls to reply to, before doing a couple of songs with his band to huge applause from the vast majority. . Rambling on ,at a time before making our own way to foreign meetings and saving a fortune, we were on an organised trip with around 4 coaches, stopping for breakfast in Bavaria in the exceedingly early hours. A group of Peterborough fans came over to the table I was sat at with my mate, to ask how we had been given a huge breakfast buffet , while they only had a couple of slices of ham, cheese, and bread each. I suggested that looking at the menu and speaking politely in German to the waiters may have had something to do with it, rather than them shouting, "Here, Adolf, what about a bit of service ?". Sadly such attitudes still remain. and in the political field in many cases. No doubt these who took the superior attitude then are the same ones who moan now the boot is on the other foot, having done a complete U turn themselves.to become the hard done by. . It wasn’t just speedway though where the British arrogance showed. I honestly believed Jimmy Hill’s analysis that German football was slow and boring with no passion, until I saw my first live Bundesliga game between Bayern and HSV, which was stunning and so superior to what our leagues churned out at the time . We then had the allegations of England losing because of cheating foreign teams. Again, having seen Dennis Bergkamp, amongst others, playing in Holland and his attitude to the game immediately ruined by his coaching over here which saw him spend most of his time on the floor. When cycling was very much a minority sport it was laughable that the likes of Phil Liggert revered riders as being English speaking as if it implied GB were doing well, didn’t he know that they were probably all English speaking ? Obviously, the top English (speaking) rider at the time; Lance Armstrong, was also the biggest drug taker. Makes you proud to be English (speaking) . I don’t think you could top show jumping for the ultimate quasi nationalism from the commentators, one of whom was also an announcer at many big events. When all GB riders had been eliminated the Australians, who had been declared as such earlier, were suddenly also representing the Commonwealth and the Germans/Dutch/Italians etc. Europe, to make it seem we were part of any victory. . The ultimate was a jump off between an American and Argentinian, well before the Malvinas conflict, in which the American was announced as, “Riding for the USA and Northern Hemisphere”. Had the Argentinian won what’s the betting he would have been representing the World to give us a share of the kudos?

I'm sorry you feel that way, but I have done NOTHING to turn norbold against you; this is all your own doing, as you were the one who - again - decided to twist everything I said, and make accusations and get insulting. I will tell you this (although you won't believe me, I'm sure) - I do not dislike you. I dislike the way you carry on a lot of the time, particularly when you are abusive, but I don't hold a grudge. There have been a number of individuals on here for whom I have had no use, but you are not one of them. This is a forum - for discussion. Not everyone is going to agree, and there is nothing wrong with that. What's wrong is the way people react. Last night, you blew everything out of proportion from the point I said that I didn't consider that the two of us were at war. Again, I don't have a problem with you, but clearly you have a problem with me. There is absolutely nothing I have said that warrants the histrionics and abuse you have directed my way over the last few days. I don't want to see you go, and frankly, I don't think there is any need for you to leave the forum, but that is your decision.

Quite frankly, Sidney, your tantrum and completely false accusations against chunky make me very wary of engaging in any more conversations with you on this Forum as it is difficult to know when you might suddenly turn on someone for no reason at all.

swindon promoters should have shown the same vision as the pirates and be with us in the championship lol

The motor doing the motor things. Was a joy to watch every week nobody could get round Armadale like that man.

Yes, I remember seeing Phil Morris do one of those one lap track record attempts. Social distancing at its best, but boring as watching paint dry

I`m pretty sure that Anglia TV filmed it for their weekly speedway programme- if my memory serves me right Keith Huewen did the interviews including the team manager of the winning team !!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6i3auq3sqw&list=FLixlQvDVOCzfjDqCX568AsA&index=34&t=0 This one is from Gorzow 2 juniors from Czestochowa crashed there are quite a few other spectacular crashes from Poland on YT where riders walked away.

Wimbledon tennis cancelled July edinburgh festival normally held for the whole of August.. cancelled schools might reopen in september odds are more likely that no Speedway league in 2020

Uunfortunately, talent and potential doesn't equal greatness. We have three supremely talented individuals there who mustered just a single world title between them.

Hmm...difficult one that. Especially deciding between Crump Jnr and Youngie for no. 1. Apart from Fundin, Crump Jnr is the only rider to finish on the podium in ten successive seasons which should make him the no.1. However, I would say that at no time was he clearly the best rider in the world in the same way that Young was. Young dominated the early 1950s in the same way as say Rickardsson did in the 2000s. To offset that however, Youngie was not in or around the elite for as long as Crumpie. My instinct would be that if we are looking at Young just in the first three or four years of the 1950s, then he would be top. If over their whole career, then Crump Jnr. So, having weighed all that up, I would go for 1. Crump Jnr 2. Young 3. Adams 4. Sanders 5. Crump Snr.

Whilst I don't condone people doing this, this rhetoric is old and stale now. A&E units are deserted in hospitals.