Vince

He is but expect him to get smoked. He rode on of the British rounds earlier in the year and was OK but certainly not on the pace of the top guys. There's a half dozen British Championship regulars and accrding to FB Bradley Smith is doing really well in the Road Race class so far.

No I am really disappointed, seems they are getting it in the USA but we aren't in Europe. Apparently it's live on the red button if you have BT sport or repeated on the tomorrow.

5 British Championship runners taking part in the open class with current British Champion Tim Neaves, brother and title contender until the last race of the season Tom Neaves, 4 times British Champion Aidan Collins, talented youngster Oliver Brindley along with experienced Kawasaki team mate .Alan Birtwhistle. Guy Martin also takes part in the open class having won the restricted class at Kings Lynn earlier this year. These riders have come on leaps and bounds in the past couple of years and while they may not be on a par with the top Americans they are some of if not the best short track riders in Europe. The Americans and European flat track regulars are competing on different wheel sizes and tyres than they are used to so might take a few races to adapt fully although you can still expect the two last American Champions to be a cut above the rest. With more and more top Road Racers using flat track for training and the British Championship being the best in Europe this sport is really starting to find it's feet over here. Record entries for meetings this year and already many more riders getting machinery ready for 2015 it looks like being a great season. Gustix is part right about the tracks although the short track seen here and in the USA isn't as different as the picture he paints they do also have much larger tracks which tend to be at car or horse racing venues. The sport is similar to Speedway over there in that it just isn't getting the spectators or press coverage that it once did but is just a fantastic spectacle.

I can't see how this is any sort of issue, makes perfect sense to me. Andrew runs the training schools so is ideally placed to see and help riders progress. I think having Andrew around for advice will make the Raiders a very good place for youngsters to learn their trade.

I think that maybe if he has to get out and work in some crap job for a year to support his family it could be the best thing he has ever done. I like Lewis and think he has the ability to do even better than he has but possibly doesn't realise how good he's had it so far, just like a lot of talented youngsters. Whatever he does I hope it works out well for him.

I think the figures for F1 for a complete season would average a whole lot more than 69,000 and count as one competition.

69,000 average attendance can't even be close to F1 which had 294,000 over 3 days at Silverstone alone in 2013.

By 1929 Speedway used to be better!

To be honest much as I hate the rule I think it has next to no effect on crowd levels. This discussion has done exactly what the BSPA are accused of on here and is all about minor tinkering with the sport that will make no real difference. It's really drastic change that would be needed to turn the sport around if that is even possible. The trouble is, like promoters, we are all too close to the sport to actually know what will attract new blood.

I think this thread proves that the decline of British Speedway is entirely down to the tactical rules, remove them immediately and see the sport soar to unprecedented heights!

It's difficult for me personally to have sympathy for Scunthorpe's position regarding team strengths. My lad was part of a Newport CL team that was full of youngsters at the start of their career that was roundly criticised by Rob Godfrey for not being competitive and therefore bad for the Conference league. I thought he was wrong at the time and still do now, if teams are willing to bring riders on and stick with them long enough for them to develop into a competitive team then they should be allowed to do so. It is hard on the top end teams but there is always the option available for them to try out a couple of youngsters when competing against a weaker team. To my way of thinking tracks like Scunthorpe and Rye House who are running training schools and NL teams should be helped financially by those teams that do neither. At the end of the day without these tracks the others don't survive.

Personally I think calling it the Joker in the World Cup is nearer the truth and the way league points are now awarded is the fair way to account for track differences. I understand the logic behind the rule but detest it, equally I never had any time for the TS either. For me the beauty of Speedway is in it's simplicity, 4 blokes line up then go hell for leather for 4 laps, first over the line wins. As soon as the guy in second wins the whole point of the sport disappears for me. Having said that I believe the impact of the TR on the numbers watching Speedway is minimal. Like most of the suggestions made it is only of significance to current Speedway fans and it will take something far more radical to get new people along to watch. Slowing the decline is one thing but with an ageing fan base it will continue so new blood is the only thing that will make the sport more popular in the long term. That's not going to come from having the top riders because Joe Bloggs doesn't know who they are, it's not going to come from any tinkering with the rules because he doesn't care about them yet. It has to come from his knowing that he will get a good entertaining night out that will be more fun than his Playstaion or the TV. Set in surroundings where he can take his missus / girlfriend or even meet the next one because the facilities are respectable and promoted so that it is the cool place for them to be. Very tall order and with some stadiums probably never possible but on the bright side I would expect the sport to survive in something like it's current form for a long time yet.

Whether they do or not they make enough money to invest in Speedway!

Having seen this feller in action I can well believe that his handiwork ruined the track for the rest of the season. If he trashed it pre season and then it is used as much as Coventry is it was never going to recover fully and I guess that long dry spells followed by some very wet weather would put paid to any improvement that had been made.

Difference being that the Jury and the appeal court judges will have had ALL the facts in front of them. Can't disagree though that if he is maintaining his innocence there can be no reason for remorse or apologies.

Can't disagree with that Dean. Couldn't believe they couldn't get a rider when I saw it on FB, you would think somebody would want to give it a go. Must admit that as much as I want to see young British riders make their way when I go to Rye House for practice days I can't help but wonder why some spend so much time sitting around in the pits. There are British kids out there though with a really good attitude and it would be unfair to tar them all with the same brush.

You only have to go to an amateur meeting at Scunthorpe to see there are plenty of people out there who want to ride Speedway. Give them the opportunity to have plenty of time on the bike and it's worth spending their hard earned money on. Let those thinking about it see that there is a system in place to help them to progress to the higher leagues and you will see more taking it up. The problem then is that for those good enough to progress through the national league into the PL so often get stopped dead by the asset system that makes an untried foreign rider a better option for a promoter. Once they get him over they'll persevere with him because they stand to gain something in the long term if he comes good. The British lad will get a few meetings and if he struggles will be out (not least because the fans will be wanting him gone). It's a big step up and these kids need a fastrack system for the PL that gives them the time to learn their trade. The asset system needs to go in my opinion and be replaced by a fund to help training tracks paid into by those teams that don't run them. Then give a team building points advantage for riders retained year on year by teams and you will maybe get your local heroes back. Don't let foreign riders drop below their assessed average for team building and you'll take away another obstacle for British riders. I would say though that those willing to come over and ride on an ACU licence giving the British leagues priority could be exempt.

Couple of things I have seen on here where riders are criticised perhaps unfairly. Everybody did used to use a car with a bike rack, however had the option been there at the time to run a van that cost no more than a car and was just as fast they all would have been in vans. The Renault Trafic we owned was better on fuel and as practical for everyday use as my wifes Megane. It even went in multi story car parks without problems. With riders required to have two bikes at a meeting these days a van is the only option anyway really and there is no cost cutting to be had by using a car. Sign writing, undoubtedly some riders have it for the ego boost but for my lad and I'm sure many others the van was sign written because a sponsor wanted it to be, it is definitely an attraction to sponsors to have a travelling billboard. For us travelling and time off work was the killer cost not engines. Difficult to see how to get around that when tracks mostly have to run when the landlord allows. The idea of a standard engine seems a good one, however as you never get two engines to run identically those with money to waste will buy several engines, select the best and sell the others on. I doubt GM would survive if Jawa were the sole engine for league racing and how long would it be before the price of the Jawa started to rise if they had a monopoly? I like the idea of engines having to be sold at say 125% of standard cost. Even better if complete bikes had a price put on them, that would really discourage people spending unnecessary money on bikes. The rev limiter is a great idea imo, might be easily fiddled by an electronics wizard but its even easier to check at any time by any bloke with a rev counter. Riders could help the costs for themselves by learning to do basic servicing (and by learning that bikes screaming on the stand are wearing out rapidly!). Clubs owning and maintaining bikes would be OK until the end of the first season when the winning teams would be accused of cheating by the fans of every other team. This would then be killing the sport because the BSPA are useless and it was much better when riders had their own engines and you knew they weren't being stitched up by the promoters!

I have always much preferred individual meetings, afraid I just don't see racing as a team event.

In American Flat track at least the cameras are not allowed to be attached to a helmet but are allowed on the bike which seems sensible.

Does Ward hold an ACU licence? If so that is his route to FIM affiliation. No idea if that makes a difference legally but it is a way that could involve the ACU. Since he admitted on TV that he was likely to be over the limit it seems unlikely that he is going to be able to get off completely on a technicality. My own opinion is that he needs a fairly harsh punishment as a warning that he needs to sort himself out. Speedway may need riders like him but it needs people who behave like he does off the track like a hole in the head. If he continues as he has been doing the sport would be better without him.

I think they weren't so worried about the riders but once the spectators started getting killed it had to stop. Actually evolved into Flat track racing on the horse trotting tracks where the same riders competed on the same bikes. They still do it now with riders on mile tracks doing over 140mph on the straights before sliding through the corners on some big twin cylinder bikes, fantastic spectacle. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fQmKWK0Z1o

He's have probably tried to exclude one of the Kings Lynn riders!!!

There are kids out here that have engine's that cost as much as a GP riders, they can't ride them and so aren't World Champion. Riders jumping on others bikes and doing well is still a case of getting on a bike that is set up for them. I bought a bike off Bjarne Pedersen several years ago for my son, we still have the dyno charts here and it made an incredible amount of power. It didn't turn him into a superstar because he didn't have the ability to either set it up perfectly or ride it as it needed to be. Put Tai on that same bike and with a couple of races to set it up he would be winning EL races. He was easily the best rider in the GP series last year and it's nonsense to say his bike was illegal now there is now ay of proving you wrong, it's not something he or Peter Johns would risk though.

His bikes were quicker with him on them, put one of the other top riders on the same bike, set up the same way and they most likely would be slower than on their own bike. Unlike F1 where you have to be in that years best car to win a Championship.