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Because the damage has been done to the track. It takes days to prepare a track properly and if it rains as much as it has done this week it will need more than an afternoon to dry out unfortunately. There is no way this was called off lightly, it was going to be the biggest Ben Fund for 10 years, it contributes over 40% of the annual funds. In addition the car park was also flooded. If they went ahead today the track at best would be very heavy, and you’d have people saying this is a farce / dangerous. Promoters can’t win, just trust that the people making this call do actually know what they’re talking about, and the last thing the Ben Fund want is more riders to look after from their own event..!

It beggars belief how some "fans" think that, just because it's sunny today, they think the meeting should go ahead, despite the fact it's been raining "all week" and "speedway is a farce" because they can't control the weather. Give yourself a shake, man.

Just after 1pm clouds building up, weather radar shows rain coming over Irish sea from IOM towards Cumbria, will probably rain by 15.00 . Must have been 8-10 inch of rain in the last week in worky, track access roads and parking under water on Thursday, no drying this early in the year, so virtually impossible to prepare the track, and parking area could turn into a bog, how would spectators feel about that. And the damage would take weeks to repair . A hard but sensible decision made IMO

Where do you think you are reading it?

Armadale's not even the second best in Scotland

It's great we can have this debate, you can make a strong argument for Glasgow, Scunny and Belle Vue as well as Redcar and Worky in terms of the best track in Britain, we have some great speedway tracks here as well as some ordinary ones and some that could and should be better than they are. It's Belle Vue for me personally but the others mentioned are all extremely good and very close behind.

Or they could have had someone signed up for weeks and just like the publicity it’s bringing them. A lot of people seem to be talking about it. I find it quite amusing how much it’s rattling people.

That's correct, all of the home meetings are streamed from Poole either by Pirates TV or BSN. All of the Pirates TV streams are now available to watch on the clubs YouTube channel, and the BSN stream will be available to watch on their platform if you had purchased the match or had the season pass etc. Thanks for your support of the streams guys.

My personal opinion is that it was as much rider error as track conditions. Had there been multiple falls then I would say track conditions were a major factor but the track had been hard packed & dispite it looking very wet from the outside it was only surface water. By not putting equipment on it kept the track in fair condition with only the bikes turning the dirt. race times were consistent for the whole 15 races so little or no deteriation to the racing surface occured. Both sides should be congratulated on a great nights racing & the track staff must have worked overtime after the practice day to produce the track we were served.

Bit of a surprise as teams normally go with the weakest member of the top 5 at 2. That’s a strong looking opening pairing though and should be getting the team off to a good start in meetings. Ellis in heat 8 should pick up plenty of heat wins also.

Bit of an overreaction don’t you think? The weather has been atrocious all week up here so correct call to PP the meeting. As for next week being off too, I’m sure you’d soon complain if it went ahead with a field nowhere near as attractive as was planned? No pleasing some folk. As for the bickering, it’s a forum, people can write what they want, whether you agree/disagree, like or don’t like, is on you.

About time too!! The sport really shouldve been pushing for John to receive recognition such as an OBE/MBE by now........

Speedway GP markets itself as world’s best 15. Kvech? Huckenbeck?. No Laguta or Sayfutdinov. Take away the top 3 from last year and we have 12 who in the main could be replaced with another 12, no disrespect to Dan and Robert.

Who's Wirral ? Surely any points he scored should be deleted as I don't think he's signed on.

Luke Becker on team USA training elsewhere now so patryk woldyo replaces

He means Armadale.....

Thanks Lisa always worth another several dozen views.

What do you want them to do? If they haven't signed anyone, they haven't signed anyone. The rider has to be right for Workington, that's financially (I guess that's the main one), points wise, availability and the right "fit" for the team.

Certainly not a farce, if you’ve been down there you would know that. The place is flooded, it would have been a farce had it gone ahead. One bright blue cold morning does not dry out a months worth of rain. Maybe some work to level out the affected areas like the pits gate will take place, but they can’t do anything at once.

I have no issues with the Ben Fund meetings being postponed, I had no plans to go to the Ben fund, it's still hockey season and that takes priority for me. But the meeting on 31st, I was 100% going to attend. It's the delay in announcing the last rider that's getting boring now. I'm not even a Workington fan and the radio silence is deafening. I don't care if 16 amateurs race or 16 of the worlds best race, if the racing is close then it's a good night out. If it's Freddie Lindgren vs wobbler 2 and wobbler 3 I'm not interested. If I wanted to watch riders riding alone I'd go to a practice session. Bicker about important stuff, but when it gets personal and people are bickering about quite literally nothing, or getting at eachother's throats, it turns the whole forum into a sack of rubbishe, which is a shame because it's the best place to get news in speedway... I hope Northside is as good as people make it out to be. I'm sure I'll be along at some point during the season when I find my interest again. Few meetings at Redcar, the best track in the country, should do it...

There is precious little benefit in having a speedway season ticket in most offerings so Id say good on them for this - a perfect way of offering some extra value for the commitment shown

Why not race it the Sunday of the Polish Final (there's 3 of them to choose from). Don't think there'll be any Polish League fixtures these days, so apart from the top Poles, everyone else should be available. Should run the British Final the same day as one of the Polish finals for the same reason.

Totally agree with that but can you imagine the howls of indignation at how the field was not the standard that had been put together for the first try at running? Another case of whatever a speedway promotion does, it is wrong in some people's view.

So we had two planned meetings on Thursday. One went ahead on a damp track and the other was called off. Some supporters have said that the meeting that went ahead should have been called off and at the same time others have criticised the promotion who called their meeting off for not trying to run. Seems to me that whatever the two promotions had done they would be told they had done the wrong thing! I constantly read that promoters don't have a clue but when there are only two possible actions in a situation both courses of action are criticised. Maybe this shows just how difficult it is to run a speedway track and maybe we should accept that while we all think we understand how things should be run, we are not the ones who can lose a fortune running the sport.

Yeah it’s a big shame, still get to see some action next weekend with the P&P day on Sat 23rd at 12pm

Finally JL getting the deserved recognition, and CL too

Whys it matter… signed before Christmas weren't they?? Can they not spell his name or something is that why its not released

In which case they deserve credit for getting the call right and saving everybody loads of time, effort and money I'd have thought?

In the good old days when most clubs ran weekly meetings an early season start with challenge matches etc. to get race fit seem to be the norm. Now with a much smaller league and some clubs running once every two/three weeks, I really do not understand why racing starts in March and then you have the lack of meetings in the height of summer. I accept that riders have more European meetings etc and demands on the track time in each country but surely it is time that the idiots in charge of the sport in this country worked out a formula that catered for the UK market/punter. Who wants to stand on a cold wet terrace in March or October. Yes it had to happen years ago because of the number of teams but the sport today is a shadow of its former self and many of today’s promoters would not have coped in the 70’s, 80’s and even the 90’s. Today a meeting gets called off on a forecast, not actually what the weather is like and they wonder why punters, think the sport is a joke with riders who cannot be bothered and promoters who not only fail to promote but can’t even get a meeting on when you have a bit of drizzle. It is not as if many tracks attract the opposing teams supporters, not many travel to away meetings so call offs could be left to the last minute as it is mainly only local support trundling along to see the match and very few turn up hours before the start so ample time to inform all of a call off. Is it any wonder no one outside the diehards credit speedway as being professional. Exhilarating it maybe but that in itself does not make up for the rest of it failings.

Speedway is part of the entertainment industry, and a priority for any entertainment business is getting bums on seats. Celina will probably put more bums on seats than any other rider in the field, so of course she's there on merit. With the PCMT field usually being around GP standard, she'll struggle to pick up points, but she's certainly good enough to pick up points in the Championship for Workington in a second string/senior reserve role.

Can the admin team please lock this thread - or better still transfer to the Speedway News and Discussions folder ?