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Showing content with the highest reputation on 10/20/2024 in all areas
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5 points
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The price admission is relative to the amount of interest there is in live attendances at motorsport, speedway while once a crowd pleaser has been watered down to a less promotable product, youth interest in speedway and motorcycling in general is now mostly negligible. As a youngster I rode motorcycles around the woods/fields from the age of 10, with no interest from any family members, walked across 2 fields and a wood to get to my nearest scramble track ( not MX) to watch my heroes, from the age of 16 I had a job/income and a motorcycle, that motorcycle took me to Hawkstone Park, Farleigh Castle, Tirley scrambles, Local grass tracks etc.,not seeing my first speedway match until I was in my late teens. At school there were dozens like me with old bikes being thrashed every evening and weekend, when I started my apprenticeship there were 24 of us, 2/3rds of which rode motorcycles to work. I am still hooked and past pensionable age still work with motorcycles, organise a motorcycle event 3 times a year ,sell bikes and parts. The price of entry will make little difference to the crowds at speedway, unfortunately there are so many other attractions available which are more appealing to the "yoof", we have to face it, the product just does not appeal to the majority of the public these days and entry prices will not address this.5 points
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Thanks for keeping us updated it really is appreciated.4 points
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3 points
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Highly doubtful that clubs/companies can finish a season in Sept/Oct & then have their accounts completed by the time of the AGM. And frankly hard to see the relevance of clubs accounts at the promoters/league AGM.3 points
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Rained all day yesterday- track was covered but they need more time to prepare track so meeting will start at 2.30pm UK time now. No Lebedevs - Kostigovs replaces him3 points
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This has to be the desired 1-7 in my opinion if we aren’t having a big hitter3 points
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But they don't drag out the system to riders over 21, and don't "protect" heats to give them an advantage others don't get.. That is just contrived nonsense in a sporting context.. We now have "professional RS's" who year in, year out, take a slot but don't progress.. With many, "well behind", during races, which adds nothing to a speedway meeting.. Like a non league footballer playing Premier League football and not being allowed to be taken off for 70 mins.. Just use the system in the 2nd tier and let the odd " next superstar", take a place on merit if good enough to compete eg Bewley,Lambert etc.. The gap is too big currently for them between the best riders at each meeting and themselves.. Which won't help them develop, and doesn't help what's on offer entertainment wise..3 points
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It's Different times I suppose. Throughout the 70s,80s and 90's we had young talent coming through by bucketloads, but that was because we had a great feeder program called grass track. Now we have kids starting out in the youth series under Neil Vatcher. They just progress through the ranks and ride against each and because of the lack of riders compared to yesteryear, they all get a team place in the NDL. They then progress into the CL and as we have witnessed this season, even in a very low standard CL they are not good enough. How many of the riders who made their debut over the last two season in the CL would you say have a bright future? Young Luke Harrison, Killeen, Dan Thompson Look the best contenders to me. Some of the others look so far out of their depth and wlll never make it. That is not their fault. It's the system.3 points
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Just taking stock of this whole RS thing. Trying to promote young British talent is just masking the fact that the sport in this country has failed to attract interest and sponsorship on a national scale for some time. Promoting the sport does not just attract spectators but has a knock affect for potential riders wanting to take up the sport. The RS system and protected heats (in the football world would equate to not allowed to tackle this player….come on!) reflect poorly from the outside for the top tier of this professional sport. The powers that be are kidding nobody. If the No.7s aren’t up to it, they should be competing at a lower level until they are ready (if ever) to compete. I’m all for giving youth a chance in any sport, but it if this RS system continues in this format, a few riders could decide to call it a day if their confidence is continually knocked through performances due to the positions they are put in. If there aren’t enough competitive riders to go round adopt 6 man teams? I took time out from speedway after the Lions demise in the early 80’s but always look back on the young talents of that era who weren’t wrapped in cotton wool and succeeded because of their ability. Michael Lee is the best example I can think of.3 points
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Think it will be 40, certainly hope it will be. I suspect the powers that be want to delete championship to become a tiny bit better than NDL in order to make premiership look so much better. Despite the fact that championship has been the best league for many years. This deason has been a disaster fixture wise and the fact that particularly 1 club is against 2h and 2a because they run 3 teams is not good for the whole sport, let them drop their championship team or allow 2h 2a3 points
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Wherever he ends up he should be encouraged rather than vilified a young kid who clearly has talent but a raw talent. Starting a thread questioning if a young kid is dangerous is over the top.3 points
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Ben doesn't need to do Champ anymore and ending on a possible treble before you move on is good way to go imo.2 points
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2 points
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You are quite correct. The riders you mentioned have not gone on to be GP standard, but I would suggest all three ride in the hardest league in the world. Bar Bewley and Lambert, no other British rider is competing at that level. Of course you could say, " put them on a uk track and they would be pants" but the facts are they all ride in the main body of the team and don't if they are struggling get to drop back down to reserve. If they don’t perform they are then shipped off to the lower leagues. Out of interest, the Polish U24 league has a list of the top 100 riders. Young Aussie Keynan Rew is top. You have to go down to 35 Rowe, 38 Flint and 55 Giilkes https://ekstraliga.pl/en/se/classification-list/u24e/2024 So the above British riders should surely be a lot higher up that list, due to riding in our top league?2 points
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Why would Poole want a 38 point limit having been against it for the last few years?2 points
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No wonder if you're trying to put milk IN your cornflakes.2 points
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It has made their league system sustainable though which is ideally, imo, what it should all be about. They're not "reliant" on foreign imports and double up/downers... Rising Star is perhaps not the name for the system, there are many ingredients that go into making a rider a "Star" many of which can't be taught and they won't find trailing around adrift at the back of every race... it should be Rising Journeyman as these types are the life blood of any sport. Stars for bums on seats, journeyman to keep the sport sustainable.2 points
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Magic just fits: Janowski 7.02 (or Cook 6.99) Iversen 6.83 Klindt 6.59 Kvech 6.58 Lawson 6.91 Harris 6.06 Boughen 39.99 Like @Bald Blokehas mentioned before, having Magic in the side would be my preferred option as well. He would give us more top end strength for heats 13 & 15 and clearly likes the Lynn track. Got 16 from 6 rides and 14+2 from 7 rides on his two visits last season. He wouldn’t come cheap though and I’d guess Oxford would be favourites for his signature. Ben Cook would also be a decent option. Side would be 39.96 with his inclusion instead of Janowski. But his average comes from riding in the middle order, not at 1 or 5. He’d start as our No 1 which is a step up. But I do wonder if Ben might end up at Birmingham with his brother. But with either in the team (and Lawson), it should be a match for anyone at home, especially considering we saw off Sheffield, Belle Vue (albeit without Kurtz) and Leicester reasonably comfortably with a much weaker side than that. But if we don’t get Lawson and either one of Magic or Cook, that could make things tricky.2 points
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If it's a 40.00 limit then you won't get many teams better than this in the Championship if any. Two massive hitters with bags of experience plus 4 PREM reserves who've all got improvement left in them, No journeyman. 1. Masters 2. Boughen 3. Jenkins 4. Gilkes 5. Nicholls 6. Killeen 7. Scott = 39.852 points
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But the PZM identified this as a weakness in the Polish system and they came up with the under 24 league to give additional opportunities to 22 and 23 year olds. The main problem with our system is that it applies to the wrong league.2 points
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All BSB rounds are £47 admission covering all three days plus free parking,think that's good value.2 points
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How many of the world beating polish juniors have developed into top top riders tho? They get huge sponsorship and top notch coaching and equipment early which imo gives a false perspective of ability. the polish dominance at junior goes back a long way and very few have gone on to be top Grand Prix level riders where are the likes of drabik and smektala now, cierniak didn’t set it alight last season either. And it goes way back to the likes of Robert miskowiak, karol zabik, Arthur mrozcka…2 points
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Polish speedway? We’re talking about the UK here. Adopting the Poles approach ain’t the answer if the riders are not out there. The Poles have continually produced riders who improve because they are being attracted in to the sport which appears to be well run over there. Don’t tell me that the meteoric rise of Lambert and Bewley is down to British Speedway nurturing. These are riders are where they are through ability and determination to succeed where ever opportunities arise. The nearest we have to these guys is Tom Brennan (Woffy is on the countdown now). There is a big gap after Tom for the foreseeable.2 points
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I think that is exactly why the club are going with this kind of lineup. All riders with connections to the club and/or a track record of giving UK speedway respect. After all the hassles with Musielak and Tarasenko, we need a settled side. There’s nothing you can do about injuries, but you know these riders won’t mess us around.2 points
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Agree don’t think many Berwick fans would want Batchelor.No doubting hie talent but his attitude can be suspect.1 point
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Most riders try and get as much as they can regardless1 point
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That comment confuses me, as the most promising young Brit since Robert Lambert, why would anyone accuse Leicester of favouritism if they signed Cairns? By all means go to a track which he thinks will progress his career (Belle Vue not Poole), but I wouldn't go to another track just to avoid riding for his Dad. For the last bit, if he wants to make his own way in the sport, should his Dad say "well you pay Greg Hancock for his training sessions then" lol!1 point
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1 point
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I'm guessing they had a team lined up that came in under 38 and wanted to go with it,fortunately majority makes the decision.1 point
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Lyon said it on the King’s Lynn podcast on Spotify, mainly Mondays for home meetings in 20251 point
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1 point
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Depends how many league matches they have left. If they planned it so they had only 5 league matches left (plus BSN, KOC & play-offs) Cairns could still be on a 2.00 average for 2026!1 point
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From what I’m hearing that team is looking very likely now,I would be pretty happy with that,the team defo has plenty of balance to it,decent enough top4 to get you through meetings plus Thomsen and Foord who have proved better than there averages and when cairns comes in then you’ll most likely have Thomsen back at reserve again.1 point
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1 point
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What's the point in having a successful national team if you're not going to use that for the betterment of the sport in your own country? The way things stand at the moment with the non appearance of Team GB... in GB, are that they are just entries in the history books.1 point
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But what about the Polish leagues, their clubs have to include 2 x Polish juniors in all divisions, seems to work very well for them if you look at their success at junior level. The RS system is just a (much) smaller version of that. If anything this system should being riders on more as if they're good enough they'll move into the top 5 (Brennan, Rowe, Dan T for example). The Polish juniors stay at reserve all year. I don't think it's anything to do with lack of riders, just wanting to give young Brits a chance.1 point
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1 point
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The Grandstand was fine after our last meeting. Four months later a commissioned report by the land promoters stated it was to be condemned and would take over £1m to rectify. The thing is, if you pay good money for a report to be commissioned, it will generally say what you want it to. Personally I don’t think there is anything wrong with the Grandstand and it could be serviceable almost immediately, when the parts removed are replaced. It’s not exactly made of wood, cardboard or straw.1 point
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Was he that bad. He showed some good form at Poole earlier in the season but tailed off at the end like he did with Leicester1 point
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1 point
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Motowizja come on air at 1.45pm UK time tomorrow. Meeting should start at 1.30pm UK time so i`m expecting a hold to the 1st heat. Link http://kergel.ucoz.lv/index/live_stream_2/0-121 point
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Sorry to hijack the pension discussions but this topic is about the cost of attending speedway meetings. For a professional (don’t laugh) sport admission costs are not unreasonable compared with other sports. Should you wish to spend your disposable income on live music as an alternative, you could sacrifice your speedway season ticket and pay to watch a rock or pop band perform a one off gig at a stadium for a couple of hours. Life is expensive in case some people aren’t aware.1 point
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I write as a person of pensionable age who considers himself lucky & fortunate enough to have had a career with associated remuneration/pension and investments to comfortably afford retirement....as I say, I am both lucky & fortunate. Now onto my post inspired by the the points you have made which appear to be both insensitive and inaccurate. Please consider that the vast majority of folk retiring in 2024, started work back in 1974 (with folk over 66 starting work even earlier) when types of pension schemes were limited and yes, the state pension was a sum which was considered & promoted to be sufficient to live on. That said, many larger companies did provide a contributory defined benefit scheme based on accruals of 1/70 or if you were lucky 1/60. Of course many of these schemes are now closed as a result of the disappearing business's with the funds (if remaining) managed by the Pension Protection Fund offering fixed rates of income that are not in line with final salary. This scenario currently effects some 9.6million folk which is 74% of current pensioners. So although many folk had made provisions in addition to the state pension they have been greatly affected by the collapse of such schemes with little time left to make up via other means. Conversely, there is no "myth" about civil servants/local government pension schemes. Example, The Local Government Pension Scheme is a salary related benefit scheme (not affected by stock markets/investment fund performance etc) based on 1/49 accrual rate with employees contributing 25% and the employer 75% of the required contributions. This is a long established and exceptional scheme in comparison to anything available in the private sector and one of the main attractions to working in local government and similar public sectors and as previously stated - no myth.1 point
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Wouldn’t say he’s on a false average, it’s probably about right for him. Notorious bottler in the big heats.1 point
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1 point
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In all fairness, he had the talent to go all the way and suffered from plenty of horrendous injuries that most wouldn't come back from. Can't knock him for that. The crash at Lynn in particular, to actually come back from that and score as well as he did in the following years is insane.1 point
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thank you for your reply, I'm really sorry - you'd think the owners would be happy for the extra rent and food/ drink outlet income. Always been a Teesside/ Middlesbrough fan but enjoyed Brough1 point
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R.I.P. Len. A very good rider in his day and knew how to Promote the sport and put on a show.One of the last genuine Promoters of the sport he loved.1 point
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Only a guesstimate but i would think 12th October.1 point