Halifaxtiger

For me, Gem, your comment that you would not attend the Storm's most important match of the season on the Wednesday/Friday because of the state of the track on Sunday just about sums up just how damaging crap tracks are. You are clearly very passionate about Coventry Speedway and have taken to the NL completely. Its fair to say, then, that poor racing surfaces are sufficient to drive away even the most committed fan.

One of my pet grievances is full price for an old programme with an insert - its nothing less than a rip off. Somerset did them for half price and Debbie Hancock even explained her position in the insert, which is a welcome change. The only other club I know for certain does that is Plymouth.

What doesn't wash with me (and most others) is the endless stream of excuses about why the Coventry track is so poor - because this isn't just about Sunday week, its about all season. Others have exactly the same issues yet produce very good, decent or even adequate racing tracks week after week - Belle Vue & King's Lynn to name two. The point is If they can do it why can't Coventry ? Why has Brandon deteriorated so badly in the last couple of seasons ? Last Sunday week, the soft, grippy patch going into the third corner was apparently discovered by the referee and Chris Louis after track preparation had finished. Many fans and every rider and official know that grippy surfaces going into a corner can be very dangerous, because it fires riders across the track towards the fence. So either the trackman knew that was the case and did nothing about it which is grossly irresponsible, or he knew about it and wasn't aware of its effect which is grossly incompetent, or he didn't know about it at all which is equally grossly incompetent. Care to say which it was ? I have seen the Mildenhall track so badly damaged by stock cars the previous night that on a Sunday morning it looks like it has been hit by an RAF air raid. Less than 6 hours later, it had been turned into a superb speedway racing surface by Robert Huggins. That's why I regard all this talk about stock cars, weather, Sky television and heaven knows what else as cheap excuses to mask nothing other than incompetence and an utter lack of care towards paying customers. Personally, I would say you would be better off explaining why Coventry can't prepare a decent track when everyone else can, because that's the issue here.

No, he doesn't.

While I would have preferred to see Jorgensen stay at Scunny (I should say that I enjoyed my speedway at EWR so much last season that I am seriously thinking of buying a season ticket for 2015) it may work to the Scorpions advantage if he is allowed to go out on loan for a year or two.

'Powerful and independent' being most important and preceisly the opposite to what we have now. I suppose there is a case to suggest that if they are more successful we have to consider what they do that we don't but aside from that I agree. Spot on. Read any thread on here and complaints are about crap tracks, poor presentation and stupid, unnecessary delay. Get them right before anything else.

Develop the bends and put a roof on the back straight stand and it could hold FIM events.

At the moment, the best stadium in the country is Central Park, Sittingbourne.

I hear what you are saying and thank you for your honesty. The problem is it doesn't wash for one second with me and, I suspect, almost everyone else.

The way I see it, its no different to PL or EL. There is a disparity between the riders but no more than that in either of the other two leagues. The quality of what you see is as dependent on the state of the track as in the EL or PL, too. Best pass I have seen this season was made by an NL rider - albeit Jon Armstrong - on a track that I would rate as fair and good as virtually any other and better than most anywhere - Mildenhall. Eastbourne's best season's have mostly come in the lower tier of British Speedway. I think Arlington will suit the NL boys and with a few local lads in backed up by one or two more experienced campaigners I see no reason why they can't have a big season both on and off track. Whatever the case, its brilliant that the Eagles are still running and all credit to Uncle Bob for that.

Either that or fan who sticks by his team no matter what( (unlike, in my experience, a substantial minority of speedway fans) or, just possibly, both.

Last race was 6.30, definitely. Having said that, 3 hours for 24 heats isn't at all bad - particularly given the necessity of a break. What's also true is that the final took about 45 minutes and had some decent racing thrown in. The sadness of that is it was utterly overshadowed by the events at the beginning of the meeting and the quality of the racing in the semi finals.

............and I followed up yours on the Coventry website and found out that the last stock car meeting at Brandon was on 5 October, three weeks before Sunday's 4TT. It beggars belief that you can use as an excuse for poor track preparation a meeting that took place three weeks before hand. The simple truth is that that track on Sunday was dangerous, and whoever prepared it either knew that or is unfit to do the job. The Coventry track has been dreadful all year, and all the excuses in the world simply won't wash with speedway fans when others that hold F1 stocks (and both Belle Vue and King's Lynn do) can produce decent racing surfaces week after week. Crap tracks are an absolute disaster for speedway, and at the moment Coventry are at (or near) the top of the list for that. The person who I have most sympathy for is Mick Horton. Track preparation is completely out of his control, yet he takes most of the flak about it and it is his business that is damaged by it.

Sums it up in a nutshell, Gem. If this meeting had been a cracker full of excellent racing there would have been a huge crowd tomorrow night. Because it was crap, people simply won't bother - and who can blame them ? Its very difficult to argue with those remarks but general belief on the PL threads is that having qualifying rounds is simply uneconomical.

Certainly not. It was in response to post 9 which hadn't been lined up correctly. I thought your post was very fair indeed

Add Kyle Newman to the list. Not reflected in overall figures maybe but in the latter part of the season he was just superb.

I was FAR from quite at the beginning of the season and I said the team would fail again under this mamagement and promotion. I just stopped posting so that we could see how things panned out. Now I am back on to do a bit of 'Told you so' now that Stoke has failed again, as I predicted. That is true. Before the season you were pretty noisy. Its was when Stoke were doing well that you shut up, because there's no way you'd give the present promotion the slightest bit of credit. I bet you are really disappointed that Malcolm hasn't taken the bait and that it is you and not he who is getting all the flak.

According to the NL 4's thread, the stock cars were a week ago. About three weeks ago, I went to Scunthorpe for a meeting when they had had stocks the day before. The track wasn't as excellent as usual, but it was miles better than yesterday's. If Mr Godfrey can do it, why can't Coventry ?

If Malcolm has any sense he won't respond to someone who never says a good word about the promotion and who was very, very quiet indeed at the start of the year when everyone was commenting about the fact that gates were up, the team looked good and the track was far, far better than it had been. I am sure he will reserve his comments for the genuine fans who were disappointed with 2014, not those who positively relish that it wasn't a good year for the Potters. Stoke's season was destroyed when Ben Wilson left and James McBain got injured. Up to that point, they had one of best reserves in the league and one of the most potent No 1's. I had them down as dark horses for the league and with that team almost certainties for the play offs. There's a possibility that they might have seen that Wilson would leave, but McBain's injury was something that could not be predicted. I'd maintain that the track still isn't anywhere near as good as it should be - to me, its one of the best shaped in the country - but it had improved and that and the team line up at the start of the season were reflected in increased attendances at that point. Stoke at least tried to change things for the better and that's all to their credit.

This isn't you, then: I'd say from that list your qualifications very much stand up. What I saw yesterday would suggest otherwise although, to be fair, you have said you are not the track curator. Perhaps it would be better if you were.

As one or two have pointed out, Mick Horton is not responsible for track preparation at Coventry. As I understand it, it was part of the agreement when he took over that the stadium would do that. As such, he has about as much control over the state of the track as he does over the weather. It is therefore unreasonable to blame him not just for the fiasco today, but for the poor condition of the surface at Brandon all season. Lets start pointing fingers at those who are actually culpable - the stadium owner and the incompetents he employs. According to the riders and officials I spoke to, the track at start time was dangerous due to a soft area on the third bend to the degree that riders were refusing to ride and there was talk of abandonment. All were critical of Coventry's track staff. It was remedied by pouring six sacks of cement into the hole created by the digging out of the soft spot and, while the riders were certainly wary, I didn't think it was dangerous - indeed, there were more problems on the second bend. I thought the semi finals were poor, though, with little decent racing. The final, however, wasn't bad at all and was run in 45 minutes or so which was pretty impressive. Whoever is to blame, we once again had the sight of fans being allowed to enter a stadium when there was a very real threat of abandonment on a day almost perfect for speedway. With that sort of couldn't care less attitude to the paying supporter, its little wonder the sport is on its knees. As to the question 'who'd be a trackman ?' I'd say somewone whose skills run to a bit more than continually trotting out excuses why their track is so poor.

Is it ? Posted 24 September 2014 - 02:17 PM I see on Kent OnLine that Mr Cearns has said he will review the situation before deciding whether to appeal or not and that he needs 1000 people every week to progress. I find the 1000 interesting, if you read the Speedway Updates the guy who texts every week always says its over that so should not be a problem !!! (although I have heard from people who go reguarly that they estimate its closer to 500-600, and sometimes less than that). Posted 14 May 2013 - 09:45 AM Crowd last night we thought was around 1,000,so not bad at all. Also have to say listening to fans they seem to know it will take time for the team to get going. How are the crowds this year compared to last ? Although in the report in the SS it says there was a "bumper" crowd v K.Lynn,I thought the crowd was disappointing, as v Mildenhall. Just my opinion. One final quote about that day from a Kent fan: 'The Co Promoters, Referee and Paramedic should all hang their heads in shame yesterday and thank their lucky stars that no riders were seriously injured'.

Went to 79 meetings last season at 24 different tracks. That's the longest 15 heat meeting I have been to, and I struggling to think of one that has been longer in the past. Personally, I would say that if an individual has a concern (toilets, car parking, officials etc) that is particular to them then an E mail is appropriate. When it is something that concerns every single person in attendance at a meeting and is in respect of an issue that every speedway fan would put at the top of their list (rider safety) then a public statement should be made on the clubs website at least. Indeed, in my experience that is precisely the practice that speedway teams follow. After all, if the club has nothing to hide, where's the problem and why should it be necessary to E mail in ? I'd say the refusal to answer justifiable questions over safety standards publicly suggests that something is amiss and asking people to E mail in is both a sop and a damage limitation exercise. As I didn't E mail in, I can only go on what I saw that day and hearsay afterwards. As Blackbird has pointed out, there were a number of crashes and not once did the ambulance go onto the track. We then had the dreadful sight of a rider, clearly in considerable pain, being forced to walk the entire length of the back straight to the pits. That is both appalling and, in my experience, unique. I was then told that the ambulance didn't come on because it had been damaged going on to the track through the pits entrance in the past and the medical cover provider refused to allow that to happen again. The bit I am unaware of is whether the Kent promotion knew that was the case, failed to make alternative arrangements and went ahead with the meeting anyway. I'd say now is an excellent opportunity for you to give your side of the story on the pages of this forum - and as I have said, I see no reason why that cannot be the case - but given your apparent determination not to make the details public I doubt that will happen. I suspect most will draw their own conclusions from that. I suppose that with a deal of imagination, paranoia and bias 3 posts in 6 months might be termed as 'continual harping' and a 'vendetta', especially if there is a desire to discredit the poster because you really don't like what he is saying and, worse, because he has a point. I might suggest that the first post was a response to the events of that day on the day that was entirely consistent with and reflective of other views and the second was an honest response to 'longest meeting'. Many posters have stated that two reasons why the sport is on its knees are crap tracks and ridiculous delays. I daresay every fan would say that inadequate safety cover would be worse, albeit for different reasons. I'd say that highlighting a meeting in which the track surface was truly awful (which might be a reason why there were so many crashes), took 3 hours to run and there were concerns over medical cover in a thread marked 'all that is wrong with the sport' is entirely appropriate. You still haven't changed the record, have you ? To be fair, you are not the only club official who when confronted with criticism (no matter how genuine or reasonable) either ignores it (and you haven't answered Orion's question) or slags off the person being critical insead of giving a fair and full explanation in respect of the matters raised. Ask yourself this - is that sort of attitude towards paying customers more or less likely to make them return to Kent Speedway ? There might be hundreds who attend Central Park each week. From what I have heard, it is hundreds less than it was.

I wonder why ? First things first. I am not Mildenhall fan, I'm a neutral (as anyone who knows me would confirm). I am also pleased to say that I am entirely objective in my comments and therefore completely unbiased. Unlike you, that is. I think that I have mentioned the meeting three times. That day, and when threads about 'longest meetings' and 'everything that is wrong with speedway' came up recently it seemed most appropriate to do so again. I have seen 79 matches this season and been to every track bar 4. No 15 heat match I have been to took anywhere near as long to run as that one. I know Kent are good at hitting curfews. If you'd been there you would have noted how fast the last few heats were run so they could hit it. Are you seriously suggesting that Kent fans or other neutrals were perfectly happy with that meeting ? That's positively As you are fully aware, the delays that day were just one part of a truly awful meeting run on a dreadful racing surface and with the simply appalling sight of an injured rider being forced to walk the length of a straight because the ambulance could not be brought on to the track. That, too, is unique in my experience and I doubt if there are many who do not realise the implications of an inability to be able to bring an ambulance trackside. That's why mentioning that meeting in the 'everything that is wrong with speedway' thread seemed most appropriate. I daresay your promise that Mildenhall will not be there on bank holiday Monday will make their fans very happy indeed. Based upon last years experience, I suspect there will be one clubs fans who will not be so happy. It won't make any difference to me as Kent are joining two other teams that I boycott until they do something about the track.. As for changing the record, that is for you to do, not I. You should be publicly apologising to all present for what happened that day, yet I have seen nothing of the kind - just an arrogant refusal to do so. I have said elsewhere that when fans make genuine and fully justifiable complaint all they receive is appalling responses from official mouth pieces and what you have said above is both typical and very aptly proves my point.

Quite clearly very sincere comments and as such they are of value. I have done 79 meetings this season across all the leagues (a new record for me, with one or two maybe to come) and have been to all tracks except Cradley,Poole, (due to logistics) Coventry & Buxton (by design). I actually think that the racing as a whole has been slightly better this season than last. Those tracks that are usually pretty good have maintained that standard whilst others (Belle Vue, Redcar & Glasgow in particular) have stepped up their game. The quality of presentation, too, seems to have improved a bit and I'd agree that referees seem to be getting the message about the fact that most fans don't like delays. All that is to the good of the sport. Sadly, some tracks still take fans for granted and seem to have 'a get what you are given and be grateful' attitude. That's reflected principally in track preparation but also in other areas too, and some of the responses to genuine and justified criticism have been appalling. I agree that guests are a necessary evil in that they are better than the alternative, but this season it has descended into farce with few meetings being completed with 7 declared riders. That has to change. The play offs are here to stay. The PL ones, though, need to be 4 teams not 6. 6 just doesn't work. The fast track system is OK but it needs tweaking and I think that has been recognised. Attendances haven't been good but I remain unconvinced that they have decreased significantly from last season. It might be said that with Birmingham closing and Peterborough on the brink of closure it hasn't been a good year. However, both clubs are subject to rescue attempts, noise has been made about a new track at Milton Keynes and Isle of Wight could be coming back. The NL next season could have more teams than it has had for a decade. Its not all gloom and doom. The shananigans that go on behind the scenes and the greed, cheating and spite that seem part and parcel of speedway annoy the hell out of me. I have to say, though, that when I am watching a meeting of the quality of Glasgow v Plymouth, Scunthorpe v Ipswich or Redcar v Workington the last thing I am thinking about is what schemes Matt Ford or Chris Van Straaten are planning and long may it stay that way.