Humphrey Appleby

That plan just struck me as a vehicle for getting Poole into the British League cheaply. Any plan that doesn't address the long-term issues with equitable rider distribution, the transfer market, and rider development and progression is always going to be doomed to failure. The National League appeared healthy in the 1980s, but the second tier is only protected from the issues in the top tier whilst there is a top league, and of course there were fewer commuting riders at that level in those days. If the top league disappears, how long would it be before ambitious teams (run by hobbyist promoters) started paying over the odds for particular riders, and the star riders started wanting to miss meetings to ride in other leagues and international competitions?

Are they stacked in a pyramid shape, or maybe being used for a womens' basketball tournament...?

Sport seems to transcend economic principles, and speedway is unlikely to be any different. Plenty of top football teams can't afford the players they sign, and inevitably head towards bankruptcy as a result. It's just lucky there's usually always a sugar daddy able to bail them out until the next sucker comes along. Speedway is even more susceptible to this with its prevalence of hobbyist promoters nowadays, but there's less of preponderance of sugar daddies waiting in the wings when teams do fall. There are some speedway teams that have been run on sensible economic lines for years, but we've also seen promoters come-and-go after throwing around money that made no sense at all.

Averages don't tell the whole story. Wiggy could be rather a selfish rider, and often seemed to put long track and grasstrack commitments ahead of team commitments. Moreover, he could have bad rides at crucial times, which is less important if you're second or third heat leader, but not so great if you're carrying a team. Well what's the alternative? Just let the weak sink without trace? Speedway isn't like other sports which have an underlying pyramid of competitors trying to break through. There's only a relative handful of top-flight performers to go round, and due to the heat-based nature of speedway, if they're all concentrated in just a few teams it's going to lead to some terribly one-sided contests. Few would suggest the points limit has worked properly let alone well, but it has resulted in success generally being shared around over the years, unlike something like the Scottish Premiership that's been tediously dominated by Celtic and Rangers for the last who knows whoever long. You need to think it through. So one team inflates to 50 points or more (not beyond possibility for strong side), but then gets an injury to their top rider. So then through no fault of their own, they suddenly have to shed 8 points which would in practice mean dropping another one or two riders. It would be farcical and lack any credibility at all. Yes, but that's a failure with how the system is implemented, not the points limit itself. You could very easily provide incentives within the system to encourage teams to develop riders and keep them on a minimum average for a certain number of seasons.

Probably most teams could point to being 'hard done by' by the points limit, but after sweeping all before them in 1986, it was not unreasonable that Oxford should be forced to release a star rider, especially to a new team. That Hackney couldn't make a go of things at BL level was undoubtedly down to other reasons, but they certainly wouldn't have made a go of things if no-one had released riders. I'd not have said Wigg was really an out-and-out No. 1 for various reasons, but the likes of Marvyn Cox and Andy Grahame did go onto become significant riders for other teams when they had to be released by Oxford, which I think shows the positive aspect of the points limit. The sport has to consider the bigger picture than one promoter complaining about his own selfish interests, although I suspect Bernard Crapper was doing it for public effect and knew full well that Oxford probably couldn't afford to keep all their championship winning riders even if they could.

The point of the points limit is so that some riders have to be released, so they become available to weaker teams. If you build up to the strength of the champion team, that defeats the purpose. And the fact is there have been occasions where a lower placed team than the champion had the highest combined points. It hardly seems fair they'd have to weaken whilst the champions didn't. The 'mathematical equation' is a reflection of on-track performance to a large extent.

If you set the points limit higher, it'll just encourage some teams to go and sign riders up to that limit and will do very little for team development. I'd start with something like a 42 points limit (around the equilibrium) and allow teams to increase that limit by a certain amount for each rider U21 or in the first 3 years of their careers. Then allow a further allowance for each rider retained from the previous season, so that teams wouldn't be penalised if some of their riders improve slightly for a season for two, but equally they can't become too strong as eventually a successful team will have to release riders. So the points limit could be somewhere between (say) 42 and 49 points depending on who a team signs, but a team wouldn't just be able to go out and sign a team straight up to 49 points.

I heard it first hand that the site was supposed to be fenced, and this was a condition of the original long lease. Presumably it wasn't done because of lack of cash, or because the promoters didn't see any long-term future in the sport. I don't recall Reading ever really getting big crowds, even during their championship seasons, so that perhaps influenced the thinking. In the wider scheme of things though, it does demonstrate the short-term thinking in the sport, which in the end will kill it.

There has to be some sort of limits on team building, but the way the points limit has been implemented down the years has been detrimental to the sport, especially as it's become more-and-more punitive rather than simply there to prevent teams becoming over-strong. You do want to limit cheque book speedway, but equally you need to provide incentives to developing teams who shouldn't be torn apart because a rider has improved by a point or so. There are ways to implement that, but sadly it would seem impossible for anyone to see the bigger picture beyond one season. On that basis, you might as well pool all the riders at the end of each season, and let the teams for the following season pick them in some sort of draft system - lowest placed team picking first etc... Maybe teams could be allowed to retain a couple of riders from the previous season for continuity, but I don't think this system would be any more of a merry-go-round than what exists now.

Our league? Youve said you havent been to speedway in years. Do you really think if the top league collapses through lack of teams, the lower league wont be afflicted by the same problems when theres no-one else to employ the better riders? Both leagues have a symbiotic relationship, and their fates are inter-twined. The ridiculous self-interest that seems to pervade the second division is one of the biggest contributory reasons to the problems with the sport today.

Most if not all from about 1996 to 1999, plus a few grasstracks and ice meetings. But getting back to raising revenue - just how do you propose to do that in speedway? Even the highest level of the sport has struggled to increase revenue beyond a modest point, and is now seeing diminishing returns. Few would disagree that British speedway doesn't help itself, but it's a hard task even for your global marketing genius friends.

Did he practice what he preached? It's a statement of the bleeding obvious that you can't cut costs forever, but it might keep you in business for a while if revenue is dropping with limited prospects for improving the situation. And British speedway is currently in that situation and has the choice between that or going out of business. And I don't recall seeing Jos Vaessen at a Dutch speedway meeting ever.

How did he apply that to Dutch speedway?

People tend to forget that speedway isn't football. Speedway is effectively 15 contests (or 13 in old money) in one, so where one team is dominant, the score differential will tend to be exaggerated. Plus unlike field sports, there's only so many points available so it's possible for a meeting to be effectively over halfway through. So some sort of way of mitigating one-sidedness is desirable in speedway, although the flaw with 'joker' type rules is they're somewhat bound to the heat schedule rather being able to use a better rider when a team needs to. If cost is an issue with tactical subs though, then you could award league points for different parts of a match as well as the overall result.

And then Colin Horton who shut the team down.

Yep, but the Danish League is a shadow of its former self, hence arguably it's not working. Okay, in its heyday the Danish League did have 5-6 rider teams, but that was in a 4TT format so not completely comparable.

Where else?

It's a self-fulfilling prophecy that if you reduce team sizes, you reduce opportunities and the pool of available riders will shrink. It might address a short-term shortage, but unless it goes hand-in-hand with developing new riders, then it just creates a downward spiral. It also doesn't reduce costs except removing the travel expenses of one rider, as the other riders have to take more rides to cover the heats, and I suspect it's likely that it won't solve the injury issue as the other riders are statistically then more likely to be get injured. In fact, it would then make things even worse as there's now one less rider per rider to take R/R rides etc...

As with anything in life, you're worth what revenue you generate for your employer, and what the industry can afford. Sure speedway is quite a dangerous profession, but there are plenty of others where people risk serious injury and worse. Riders know what they're getting into, and there's many amateur motor sport competitors that take similar risks for the love of doing the sport rather than reward. Speedway does differ from other motor sports in that takes place all week rather than at the weekend when spectators have time to go and watch, and when it would be easier for riders to combine riding with another job, but perhaps that's where it's been going wrong. The SGP isn't held in the middle of the week, is it? The only thing that will reduce salaries is when the sport either finally goes bust, or promoters finally agree to work collectively rather than trying to shaft each other. You could have a common pool of riders paid centrally, allocated to teams in accordance with an agreed mechanism that ensures reasonably competitive teams, and promoters then charged for their use. These are the sorts of solutions that need to be advocated by those in the speedway industry, not statements of the bleeding obvious.

The problems have been there for many years, and articles stating the obvious come sadly too late. I don't think many of the problems highlighted would be particularly difficult to solve if there was a collective will amongst the promoters. It would be very easy to work how many riders there are, and therefore how many there are to go around without having to double-up. Then you could quite easily come-out with ways to put these riders into competitive teams - whether in a single or two league setup. The issue of race nights could probably be resolved with some will and that might reduce fixtures clashes with other leagues, but ultimately you probably need to tell the riders to pick where they're going to ride and stick with those that can commit to a full fixture list. It's absolutely ridiculous to be having gaps in the fixture list during the prime months of the season. The difficult part is getting the fans back, but that's certainly not going to happen whilst the sport continues to be organised in a farcical manner.

A bit like a 2-week journalistic attack against someone who's clearly not compos mentis, but yet is apparently lapped up by the Speedway Star readership?

You can always find a baying pack to round on those that aren't quite normal. One article would have been more than enough to discredit the 'initiative' and it was over-laboured, especially considering the reticence of the Star to go public with real news when the subjects are competent to defend themselves.

'You', meant as in the Speedway Star.

It makes for amusing reading, but the bloke is obviously not all there and is probably more in need of help than derision. Given that you've shown that you actually can do investigative journalism when want to, perhaps you can make investigation of more serious subjects a regular feature in future?

Quite an amusing read, I'll agree. Wonder what prompted this unprecented investigative journalism from the Spar though?