topsoil

Had it been a bit closer then no way Coty would have taken the r/r ride in heat 13. Nothing you can do about Kevin Doolan's chain coming off in heat 14, just one of those things. It left Leon exposed. He was inconsistent all night, well off the pace one minute, brilliant the next. The management wanted to put Leon into heat 15 which, looking back, could have been down to Spud's machinery not being up to it, after his non start in heat 10 (which would also contribute to the 5-1 in heat 13), Kevin being injured after heat 14, Jye already being in it and trying to protect Dany's paid max, so Dany was only brought in at the last minute. It was a very strange end to the meeting. It could be looked on from the outside as taking your foot off the pedal, but there may be more to it than that.

Another three points and a good win. The win was sealed in the first half of the meeting. Not much in the way of passing on a slick track, but Ben Barker and Simon Lambert provided good entertainment for the visitors. Dany Gapp looks back to good form for home meetings and all round the team look more consistent. Cracking move by Leon to win heat 12 and a special mention to the lightning quick reflexes of Simon Lambert in heat 14 which saved a potentially very nasty incident for the Captain. Always going to be a smaller crowd for a midweek meeting with work commitments, probably why the club tries to avoid them if possible. Decent take up for the new draw which should bring in some much needed funds.

Busy doing other duties? Maybe don't have time to watch the racing?

Therein lies part of the problem, promoters are not professional people. In the vast majority of cases, they are local businessmen who happen to be speedway fans. They don't have the time or money to invest in speedway full time.

I'll be honest not sure of the rules for heat 15 but you could tell by the reactions afterwards that both Leon and Coty were well chuffed to have been in heat 15 and got a 5-1 out of it.

Possibly the best thing to come out of last night. The two need each other. The supporters club do a great job of raising funds and if this can be used to help the future of the club then all the better.

Time to put things into perspective surely? Speedway is a dangerous sport. If you are going to ride a bike with no brakes at high speed, there will sooner or later be injuries. In this case there seems to have been a serious one. So the meeting is abandoned. So what is the worst thing that can happen to a supporter? Your night is inconvenienced. In this case, you get free entry into another meeting later on in the season. Compare that to the rider in hospital. I'm sure if you wanted to check, you would find examples of rugby, football and other sports where matched have been abandoned because of a serious injury. I would be pretty sure the fans wouldn't be saying that they wouldn't be going back to another match because of it. If you want to watch a dangerous sport, you have to be prepared to put up with the risks involved.

Cracking win for the tinpot club tonight, I never expected 58, but there was some consistency all the way through Berwick's scoring (everybody getting between 7 and 10). The meeting certainly livened up in the second half, started by excellent cutbacks by Dany Gapp and Spud off the second bend and up the back straight (do these count as passes?), then passing and re-passing between Leon and Kyle Newman in heat 12. Heat 15 was a bit scary, good to see Nick Morris and Jye up and walking about afterwards and hope it's not too serious for NBJ. And as usual excellent PR afterwards with the riders spending an age getting photos taken with kids.

Nice one

"Tin pot Northern club" (copyright Jon Cook)

I very rarely use facebook, I've never used Instagram or snapchat. I bow to your greater knowledge of social media.

I would imagine the club would like to have a top notch website, online shop etc (which could bring in much needed funds, I have seen it done successfully with other clubs) but if you don't have anybody at hand that can do this sort of thing, it could be difficult to get going. Okay, you could pay somebody to do it, but they might think the funds are needed for other things.

Agree 100% with this

I don't know who runs the club website, but I would think that if nothing goes on it (I've no idea, I haven't been on it for ages), then that would suggest that whoever was doing it, has either finished, or hasn't got the time to do it anymore. From my limited knowledge of computers, I don't suppose this is a job just anybody can do. Clubs rely on a lot of volunteers and these days getting people to give up their time is hard. It's probably a case of there isn't somebody to do it, rather than the club doesn't want the website updated.

I too would love the racing to be like what it is at Belle Vue each week. But how you go about getting it to that position is the $64,000 question. You can come up with suggestions like 'alter the track shape', but that simply isn't going to happen. Is it track preparation? That is something I, and I would probably guess 99% of us on here are the same, have no experience of or idea what goes on. On top of this you are dealing with limited funds and very few people willing to get involved and help.

The make up of the team is more to do with funds (or lack of), rather than any lack of ambition. If you don't have the money, you can't spend it. Plus this was basically the same team which missed out on the playoffs by a point last year. As for the league table, let's wait until we've ridden the same number of home meetings as other clubs.

The only thing that persuades riders these days is money, something speedway clubs in Britiain don't have much of. I saw Lebedevs at Berwick a few year ago in the World U21 finals. Certainly livened the meeting up.

Maybe this is an age thing? I would guess the majority of the younger audience, who the club are trying to attract, use social media like facebook. I must admit, I am on facebook, but very rarely use it, but I know it's a staple of most young people.

I always do. Mind you, I can't remember anybody from the club saying they had no interest in winning? But I'm in the dark ages, so you'll have to bring me up to date.

I would suggest the shoe is on the other foot

Good luck trying to run speedway, or any other sporting club with similar budgets, without volunteers

Name a club at this level of any sport that doesn't rely on volunteers?

We must go to the same barber

Offer to give them a hand then

Coming in to give a hand?