Humphrey Appleby

How hard can be it to organise a pairs event?

Of course they're not, even if we're talking about vastly different amounts of money. The F1 teams didn't think they were getting enough money out of the sport, despite the fact they provided much of the show, and took control of the commercial rights. Something that the professional speedway leagues should have done, rather than simply allow the FIM to sell them off and take all the money. 3 million is nothing like the profits generated by F1, but it's more than speedway is currently getting.

I'm fully aware of how things were arranged, but that does not mean those arrangements should have been accepted by those employing most of the professional riders at the time. Very different in F1 where Bernie Ecclestone and the F1 teams didn't accept how the FIA were running things.

The FIM should have been insisting on minimum facilities and city locations to host the World Final. Sweden and Poland had suitably sized stadia in cities that could cater for the spectators, but Denmark did not and that was the start of moving major events to fields in the middle of nowhere. In principle Germany also had suitable stadia such as in Munich, but a World Final should never have been allowed to be held at Norden or Pocking. And if the BSPA allowed the ACU to concur with these decisions, far less abdicating the commercial rights to the sport's premier competition, then it sums up what a short-sighted shower they were.

Yes quite, but would you also describe Teterow and Hallstavik as world class stadiums?

I very much doubt you could write the rules of most sports on a sheet of paper (unless it was a very large sheet and writing was very small), especially a sport that caters for multiple formats. 'Tear up the rulebook' is just one of those silly mantras that gets bandied about by speedway people, and you of all people should know better than to repeat that. Whether or not there should be points limits, guests, averages and the like is one debate, but whilst they're deemed to be necessary by the sport, then there's always going to need to be a degree of complexity in the regulations. If there was nothing written down about these things, it would be total chaos and even more open to ad-hoc and biased decision-making. 'Four riders doing four laps' would frankly get pretty boring pretty quickly if there wasn't any structure to it. That's why the sport quickly evolved from ad-hoc scratch races to team events. And in reality, it's really only the team building stuff and certain technical elements that are highly contentious. The rest of the rulebook, whilst it might be better written, isn't controversial.

Maybe the Under-21 rider will ride in a sidecar attached to the tandem?

Not sure what the big secret is, unless of course the FIM/BSI haven't actually worked out what the format is going to be.

Can only assume then, that the programmed rides of each team will be shared between the 3 riders (thus having 4 programmed rides each assuming 7 teams). Have a recollection that format might have been used in Poland or Sweden before.

The format has been tried before and did little or nothing to grow the sport. The sport also needs to be focusing on its core markets rather than getting distracted, because it's dying on it's a**e even in the countries that support professional leagues. It's a bit replacing the Football World Cup with a five-a-side tournament in the hope of giving the minnows more chance to be competitive, but all you'd do is disinterest your main audiences, and the minnows will still be outclassed.

Well assuming the classic 7-pair format and 3 riders in each 'pair', that makes for 21 riders per meeting. The SWC currently has up to 20 per meeting, although I think prize money is just paid as a lump sum on a per-team basis (and isn't very generous). However, the current SWC format needs 4 meetings (plus 1 or 2 qualifiers) and I'm guessing these are insufficiently lucrative, especially the Race-Off if the host nation isn't represented. You can realistically incorporate up 12 teams in just two rounds using a pairs format, whilst guaranteeing that the hosts will be in the Final, and offering the potential to run the whole thing over a weekend. Alternatively, you could have 14 teams split into 2 Semi-Finals, with the top 3 in each going through to meet the host nation in the Final. That requires 3 rounds. No idea though, what the other changes could be that would increase costs, unless they're talking about the prize money.

How then it is a team competition if you're giving countries with only one decent rider the opportunity to dominate. You might as well combine the SWC with the SGP on that basis.

Would be far better to have a GP in an more accessible place, like erm... Riga?

Yes, but that's because the current format allows for the possibility of the race-off to happen without the host nation. It would be very easy to solve that issue. I think most people would consider a best pairs competition to be a diminished SWC, but let's see...

A best pairs competition will only require 2 or 3 rounds, compared to the 4 or 5 for a 4TT. Similar numbers of riders involved in both a pairs and 4TT meeting, so similar per-round prize money can be offered.

If they haven't been turning up for the SWC in droves, I can't see why they'd turn up for a diminished competition in droves.

Errr.. yes, but there was also a 4TT format where riders rode in pairs.

It may or may not be great entertainment, but it will not be a Speedway World Cup. A 'pairs' format with a reserve was tried in the WTC before, and I think there was great relief all round when it went back to a proper team competition in 1999 (albeit with a new 4TT format). One of the genuinely good ideas that BSI had back in the day, was the concept of the SWC. The mistake (not even with hindsight) was to involve too many mismatched teams, but the 8-team format could have been tweaked into something more viable rather taking the rather lazy approach of going back to the inadequate pairs format. Even if there aren't 8 viable teams (which I struggle to believe), the final rounds could have been changed to 6 teams or something like that.

When it comes down to it, whilst many British promoters aren't really doing a great job, probably most of them are in it because of a certain love of the sport. Most I think, do not expect to make money from it, and a good number are probably subsiding their tracks. BSI are most definitely in it for the money though. There isn't essentially anything wrong with that, but the SWC is one of the genuine highlights of the calendar (even in my jaded cynical view), and somehow the FIM has been persuaded that another mickey mouse pairs event should replace it.

Is someone paying you to cheer lead?

So BSI are continuing to pay for the commercial rights for a competition they're unable to run? That wouldn't seem like good business sense, unless of course they asked to stop running the SWC. And didn't we hear that OneSport were prevented from running national teams in the European Pairs competitions because BSI supposedly objected that they were the rights holders to the World Pairs? So the competition is something we've seen before then. It's a best pairs competition with a reserve, which was the WTC format run from 1993 to 1998 except now with an under 21 reserve. Which also begs the question what Armando was rambling on about in the Spar the other week...

Phillipe is here to put a positive spin on things for BSI with whom he has a commercial relationship. Nothing wrong with that, but he cannot be considered a neutral party and he's either carefully wording his posts thinking we don't know the difference between commercial rights and inscription/permit fees, or he's just repeating BSI verbatim. Throwing in the term 'licence fees' just serves to further that confusion. And if I were the commercial rights holder of the SWC and the FIM made a decision to suspend it and replace with another team-based competition of a very similar ilk, I'd expect that to be included in the rights or be paid some sort of compensation. Of course, if the SWC wasn't sufficient profitable for me and I had a get-out clause on that basis, both parties might wish to negotiate some revised arrangement to reduce costs but ensure that both gain something from it. I think most appreciate Phillipe's participation on here, but I don't think it's unreasonable to not take everything at face value from an official source. Only a few weeks ago he was priming us for a return to a pairs format, yet now the powers-that-be seem to be discussing another format with junior riders and so on. Either someone isn't well informed, or the FIM and BSI are just making things up as they go along.

Are you talking about the meeting licence fees, because they're different to the commercial rights fees for a competition, and as far as I'm aware are payable on any meeting that's organised.

So they havent got a clue what to do then? Whats the big secret? Dont they need to let federations and host tracks know so they can plan their seasons?

Theres numerous examples of countries granting citizenship on the basis of irredentist claims.