Vince

Steve, you have no idea of the situation at Newport and yet again ignore the fact that there was a Promotion willing to run the Classic. The rent increase may not help matters but nor will the loss of guaranteed income - you do like to use the parts of a story that fit your argument don't you!

Truly gullible would be to take your spin at face value! Given that the situation at Newport was not known then then the original cut-off being set at September 30th may well have been sensible. However when it became apparent that there was a definite intention of re-opening Newport for Speedway then they could have easily been allowed a further month to establish whether they could run the event. Then as you tell us Poole were the only applicants they could have started some provisional planning although it wouldn't really be necessary. The comment about there being no chance of the meeting running at Newport is no more than spin to fit the situation. The track at Newport has been maintained and has actually been prepared with the Classic in mind. The amount of work that has gone into it would almost certainly have seen the best track ever prepared for the meeting. The infrastructure is there as was the willingness and apparently the promotin team, the application deadline was not practical for Newport given the circumstances - who imposed the deadline? Poole have stepped in to save the meeting, even the most gullible person is not going to fall for that. Whether the meeting was at Poole, Newport or anywhere else it would be run to make some money. Yet again Mr Shovlar assumes everybody else is stupid. Finally what happens if the loss of this meeting makes the running of Newport Speedway financially impossible for a new owner so it becomes an industrial estate, would you still expect us to applaud Poole for 'saving the meeting'?

Indeed I am bitter over the way Newport Speedway, it's fans, workers and new owner have been treated. I am not trying to cause havoc for Poole or their Promoters, I am expressing my displeasure at the way in which I believe they have behaved. You do not know that what you have posted is correct - unless of course you made the application, otherwise you are repeating what you have been told, as am I. Almost certainly you will get your wish with the Classic being switched around the clubs. Once it has been moved from Newport others will see no reason they should be denied a bite of the cherry. As for spin, I am not the one saying that I am posting fact while posting the party line on behalf of a promoter. In fact I have repeatedly said that I am making the judgement on what I have heard, I chose to believe this version as I don't find yours credible. Again I have made clear that I only repeat what I have heard, not to stir up a hornets nest but in reply to the original post which said it was put in prior to Tim's death. I think you are more than a little to blame with your arrogant attitude and blatant spin. People are not as stupid as you seem to think and treating them in such a patronising manner will put them against Poole Speedway far more than my opinion ever will. Until now I have never had anything against Poole Speedway, indeed I very much had a soft spot for them as I explained earlier. My opinion now is that I would never go there again. You don't like my opinion,tough, I don't go much on your attitude either.

So it would appear my source was correct about that then and that the 'summer application' was yet more spin by Mr Shovlar who has conveniently not answered the post as it doesn't match his version of events. Or does Summer start in April at my most local club? Not to worry, after some consultation he will be back with the revised version. This does destroy the credibility of the vast majority of Steve Shovlars post on this subject, more so when he ignores the difficult to answer stuff and still can't make things sound honourable. The truth is that immediately Tim died the Poole promotion jumped at an opportunity to make some more money. I would never agree with the way they have acted over this but I might have a little more respect for them if they didn't try to hide behind the 'respect for Tim Stone's memory' angle.

Steve I have just read your latest post and you are now just making it up as you go along. Whether a Promoter was installed in time for this meeting or not there was nothing to stop another promotional team running the event at Newport on his behalf. They most certainly would have drawn a huge crowd for this event but have been denied the opportunity. If you are so keen to see Newport Speedway prosper then surely you would understand that the income from this meeting could be the difference between their being able to run or not. The truth is you have absolutely no interest in Newport Speedway and couldn't care less whether they disappear or not because you think the whole Speedway world should revolve around Poole. That's OK but eventually even the best supported teams go out of business without somebody to compete against. If you want to organise a coach for people from Newport go ahead, I am sure you could fill at least half of the front row of seats. As for Mr Norwood we will really see some bitching if Poole's future is ever threatened but like Mr Shovlar if it ain't Poole you don't care.

And where did he get his information from, including the parts you were happy to quote? If any other club including Stoke and Scunthorpe had behaved the same way then I would be saying the same things about them. Given that this is now a proven money spinner of an event and you say Poole are the only applicants then I wonder why there were not a multitude of others applying. There are certainly tracks that cope better with the weather and both the clubs you happen to mention are used to operating tracks in the winter months for training schools. They could probably both do with the income and yet they didn't apply, perhaps they, and the others, felt it would be a less than proper way to behave!

Well at least he made sure that the earlier PR gaff wasn't repeated and the webmaster only puts up what he is sent. It might suit your current needs to take everybody for a fool but it ain't necessarily so

Well for starters the Poole promotion haven't gone public on any of this, only Steve Shovlars repeating what he has been told on a forum and an announcement that they will be running the New Year Classic for the first time. That is all I have done, repeat what I have been given to understand on a forum. Clearly Steve will believe his sources and I will believe mine. I don't see an article in the Star is any less public than an article on the BSPA site. As for somebody who is in the process of breaking into Speedway promotion and will need the BSPA to back him going public about anything, I can't really see that happening, can you? To reinforce the point about Steve's posts being clearly biased the following is the complete quote on the BSPA site. Not the selected part that he used to strengthen his reply to Kog, personally I can see that Kog has a valid point when he says it could have been worded better. Also nakes the earlier comment that it won't be called the New Year Classic worthless. Poole will stage the New Year Classic for the first time on January 4. Pirates bosses have won the race to stage the event after the loss of Newport following the sad passing of club boss Tim Stone. Pirates promoter Matt Ford said, " Wer'e delighted to stage this event and we want to meet the high standards set by Tim at Newport. He is sadly missed." Clearly he left the first paragraph out because it did not fit with his version. This, to my way of thinking, would make me doubt the credibility of every post he makes, even if I didn't already.

What Newport fans fail to understand is one version of events - yours, which is biased to the extreme. What it seems the Newport fans, along with many others, do understand is common decency and respect which somewhere along the line you appear to have thrown out of any argument as irrelevant.

Because he said so publicly. He announced his intention to run the meeting in the Speedway Star as soon as he was in a position to do so. I still say that if the Poole promotion only took on the running of the meeting to keep it alive then they now have the perfect opportunity to hand it over. We realise that won't happen because despite the spin Steve Shovlar is putting on it the only reason they are running the meeting is to make money.

I believe that there is more than a little spin in this statement, which you probably know only too well. The new owner of Newport Speedway asked the Reading Promotional team to run the New Year Classic. That much was reported in the Speedway Star and it would now appear that the meeting had already been allocated to Poole. I was given to understand that the application from Poole was put in very shortly after Tim's death, that may or may not be accurate but I do believe it as it came from a source that I trust. If Matt Ford was being so wonderful and only wanted to make sure the event lived on then he is now in the perfect position to prove it by handing back to the new owner of Newport! As to the question of why the meeting should stay at Newport. As stated before the whole team there were the only one's willing to put in the huge amount of time and effort to make a meeting at that time of year succesful. Nobody else wanted to run a meeting until somebody else made the format work. Newport Speedway has earned the right to that meeting over the past ten years.

Rabbit, the closing comment was made in reply to the comment by Ferndown Racer who seems to think that the possibility of a good meeting will make up for the way it was 'obtained' A view with which I can only strongly disagree. I do understand that you are telling us what you have been told. In the main I sympathise with Promoters and tend to put forward what I see as their side of an argument as I understand that their job is nowhere near as easy as it might appear. However this time I am appalled by the way the Poole promotion have acted in the chase for a few quid. For the first time in the 40 years I have been going to Speedway I want a meeting to be rained off or fail. I considered Tim a good friend and to my way of thinking this episode shows a complete lack of respect or decency.

Sorry but that doesn't really wash when the person in a position to object was dead! No other promotion was in a position to go ahead because the future of Newport was uncertain, given the meeting is not until January no application even needed to be made at the time. Or the application could have been made on the grounds of 'if Newport is unable to hold the meeting' It is greed - no more and no less that saw the application go in. Steve Shovlar's comment that it wouldn't have taken place if Poole hadn't stepped in is also nonsense given that the BSPA were fully aware of what was happening at Newport. If Poole only applied to keep the meeting alive they are now in a perfect position to hand the meeting back in the secure knowledge that it will go ahead. It's not really a loss to Poole as I rarely go there these days but I can say for sure that I will never go there again unless the promotion changes hands. That the first place I ever saw Speedway and where I spent some of the most memorable days of my childhood I now consider has acted so immorally is a great disappointment. If you view the possibilty of an improved line up as reason to behave in this way then I think you must understand Matt Ford far better than I do and I am glad I don't understand him.

Given that comment and the pride that Tim took in being the originator of the event I would have to say you didn't know Tim at all! He took a date that nobody else wanted or considered practical and made it work and then over the past few years there were many suggestions that it should be 'shared around' - presumably because it was now a proven success. The fact still remains that given the weather conditions at that time of year most tracks will suffer more cancelations than meetings. The very reason that people complained about Newport being dusty, the excellent drainage, saw only one meeting postponed in ten years I believe and that was re-run the following weekend. I doubt there is another track that could get close to matching that.

I will say that I think I made it plain that it was just something I heard, it does however fit in with the story from hawk which came from a undeniably good source but also didn't name a club. I deliberately didn't put a name to anything because it is rumour.

If that is the case then we would have to assume the rumour about the application going in 3 days after Tim's death was the correct one. It is either that or it was applied for while Newport was still running - either way it would stink!!!

I heard that the application went in only three days after Tim's death which would be even worse. Whichever is right for the reasons stated by hawk I also hope they see sense and let the meeting stay at it's rightful home. Another good reason for Newport to hold the meeting is that it is one of, if not the only, tracks capable of coping with the weather at that time of year more often than not.

I really hope that Lunchy hasn't gone on account of somebody who thinks himself highly intelligent yet is completely unable to see two points of view on the same subject and then resorts to insulting those who dare to differ from his infallible opinion. What Lunchy said one time was nowhere near as bad as Subedei has spouted on this thread alone. Could be that he has some valid points to make but I can rarely be bothered to read past the self praise or abuse of forum members and riders that start virtually every post. It would be a real shame to lose a single decent forum member on account of that eigthwit!

But we are not talking about expertise in filling a programme or rules and regulations in this case are we? We are talking about expertise in riding a bike and understanding what has happened in a racing incident. As for knowing one end of a bike from the other I would consider that I do having ridden competitvely in various disciplines for more than 30 years, as a rider though I was never at anything like Tatum's level and would bow to his vast experience and knowledge in situations like this. You never did tell us about your riding experience in comparison to Tatum's I never told you to go to specsavers I just pointed out that your statement that Crump was proven to have cut across because he came off the fence was completely wrong.

If you paid attention you would see that Crump hits the fence with his back wheel at least 50% of the time before he turns in, nothing to do with cutting across. Perhaps you could remind us of how many Speedway and Longtrack titles you have before you expect us to accept your 'expertise' rather than Tatum's. When you say the 'minority who are correct' I assume you mean like when your Mum told you that you were the only cub scout marching in step

Talking of nonsense, don't know if you noticed but that wasn't Bydgoszcz last night. It was a track with long narrow straights and tight corners where the riders have to turn a lot harder. Therefore where a rider can take a knock at Bydgoszcz and stay on at Lonigo where there is no grip and he has to turn in harder he will go down. Certainly a classic Gollob move - works a treat on big open tracks ut you would have thought he had been excluded for it enough times now to know it's not the answer on every track! There have been some terrible decisions by refs in the GP's this year but I thought he was spot on in both cases last night. Despite my usually siding with the commentators as I think they have a very difficult job I must admit that Tony Millards comments about Lindgren were terrible.

OK ljh I will try to put my point of view to some of your comments. Firstly the rider who apparently can't handle rutted tracks without resorting to foul tactics. The fact that I can't immediately know who you are talking about indicates that you have seen something to give you this view that isn't necesarily viewed in the same way by others. I have seen so many riders in trouble on bad tracks in the GP the last couple of years that I have lost count. Undoubtedly some of them can handle ruts better than others just as some can handle slick tracks better. All of them handle either better than the majority of riders and are only seen as struggling when viewed against the worlds best. Without a doubt there should be a few deep and grippy tracks in the series and there should never be some of the tracks that we do see. A variety of circuits is desirable but although the worst tracks may provide uncertain results I would rather be entertained by the skill of the worlds best riders than a lottery produced by track conditions. Slick tracks: my guess is that on the 'proper' outdoor tracks this is done so as to try and avoid rain off's rather than a great Danish conspiracy. A slick track may well be able to run in poor weather conditions that would cancel a deep one. Some of the temporary tracks though are just a disgrace imo, they desperately need to get some advice from outside the sport on how to put a temporary surface in. From what I have been told they also need to get their hands in their wallets for the track at Cardiff, as the sports showpiece that track especially should be great but is far from it. Maybe a lesser 'star' entertainer would finance a better track which would be a great swap as far as I am concerned. As for Wembley on World final night one old time rider who competed there in either the late fifties or early sixties told me it was awful for the final at least once when he was there. I can see that the battle for the championship is over but for me personally the GP's are still exciting as people battle for their overall position and for the top few to see if they are improving as the build for next year. Even then we have had several important meetings with the Championship at stake rather than just one. I am also uncomfortable with the GP series being run as a seperate entity to the rest of the sport and feel strongly that the revenue could be used to help future competitors worldwide. As for the wild card entries I can understand your point but personally I think it makes sense to be able to include a rider who had mechanical problems in the qualifying rounds or if injuries kept him out of the top 8 the previous year. Though it might be more often used to ensure riders of certain country's get a place, while possibly not strictly ethical, does make financial sense I would imagine. To me while the GP's are far from perfect they are a little closer than the one off finals. I also thoroughly enjoy watching almost all of them, the exception being when a track is so bad that the worlds best riders are made to look like CL reserves.

I think a lot of us have been around the sport so long that in truth we don't really know what would get new people 'through the door'. Therefore I think you are in a better position to comment than we are. I think some of your ideas have been tried by individual clubs but not properly by the sport as a whole. I know some clubs have had riders go into schools and give away tickets. Personally I am not sure a safety seminar and Speedway sit too well together! Like the 'hold em' ideas. 4 riders 4 laps shouldn't be as complicated as it has got. Personally I would not be interested in a mascot but there might be many like yourself who would enjoy it so worth a go (the one at Reading seems popular). Perhaps local bands or even an inexpensive light show to go with the music being played could be effective between races. I would very much like to see a roadshow with bikes, music and Speedway videos turn up at shopping centres and other highly visible areas throughout the UK. It wouldn't be that expensive in the scheme of things but could reach many thousands of potential fans. I would also like to see a large scoreboard at every track as I think it is crazy that a newcomer could lose track in his program and not know how the meeting is going.

I have seen both systems at work first hand and would take the GP's as the best way of finding the best rider in the world every time. In theory there may have been a chance for every rider to win the World Championship under the old system but as already pointed out you didn't necesarily have the worlds best 16 riders competing then any more than you do now. There was also a chance that one breakdown or bad refereeing decision could ensure that there was no hope at all of winning the title. At least now these things should tend to even out over the course of the series. The qualification system is there to get riders through to the GP's and I can't think of any rider who is likely to be in contention for the title who isn't involved. Many of the tracks are poor now and that is the worst thing about the GP's in my opinion. However anybody who thinks all the tracks for one-off finals were good is wearing rose tinted glasses (more like welding goggles really). Even the hallowed Wembley finals, terrific atmosphere and all, didn't have the best racing track by far. I went to two Wembley finals and thoroughly enjoyed them but they were far from the best Speedway meetings I have been to with regard to the racing. Unfortunately bad ref's, poor tracks, super quick engines and so on have always been a feature of the World Championship. As for a rider with good machinery and little skill winning the World Championship GP series that is utter nonsense they don't even get to compete at that level without a huge amount of skill.