Humphrey Appleby

So speedway is reduced to being a television advertisement? I've nothing against sponsorship, but it has to be sponsoring real things that people actually care about, not corporate entities.

Who's going to be interested in watching or sponsoring a mickey mouse event with made-up teams? It would be better if it took the form of domestic teams racing in some sort of international cup.

And if a women's basketball tournament happens to be on, then that's the speedway done for... Why do those need to be given a walkover if they're all riding the same number of meetings anyway? And not much incentive for the fans of Rawicz and Opole to turn out when they know they're likely to be bottom of the league whatever they do. Even the BSPA hasn't managed to come up with something as daft as this...

I'm quite confident that I could run amateur speedway as well as the ACU, and that I know the regulations better than some licensed officials. I've not refereed speedway, but I have clerked other motor sport events.

Licensed competitors can compete in both sanctioned and unsanctioned motor sport events. As with anything in motor sport, the competitor does so at their own risk, but one assumes most of the competitors at these sort of events would be amateurs anyway. I fully agree that running under an official body should be preferable, and my own take is that unsanctioned events often run under the technical and safety regulations developed by the official body anyway, which I think is slightly immoral. Equally though, for amateur events the permit costs are pretty high (in our case one third of our entry fees), the MSA didn't even have proper regulations to cover our specific discipline and we had to develop a lot of them ourselves, and then they put roadblocks in the way of running events on spurious safety grounds (one being that it's effectively impossible to run events under floodlights). There's all sorts of other daft regulations about incompatibility of officials which make sense at higher levels, but fail to take into account that amateur events usually have a shortage of volunteers, and that most of the time it's competitors organising things themselves. I know my colleagues running bike events have similar issues with the ACU, but the autotrackers seem to manage without any of the official bodies. Where professional riders can and can't ride is a matter for who they're contracted to. I don't think it's unreasonable for BSPA promoters to insist their riders only compete on ACU/SCB licensed circuits and in BSPA sanctioned meetings, but I do think it unreasonable if the BSPA is claiming exclusivity on running speedway in Britain, especially at amateur level.

Plenty of motorsport events are held outwith the jurisdiction of the official governing bodies, and the trend is increasing of late. There's a lot of scaremongering about untrained officials and lack of insurance etc.. but even officially licensed circuits can and indeed do run both sanctioned and unsanctioned events. I'd agree it's easier to get insurance if events are run under the auspices of some sort of sanctioning body, but there are alternatives to the ACU and MSA. Whilst I'd agree that official governing bodies do perform some useful roles, in my experience they've lost sight of the realities of the amateur levels of motorsport and expect everything to be run along the lines of F1 or MotoGP. I therefore don't think that having alternatives is at all unreasonable, because at amateur levels the option may in some cases be no motorsport at all.

I wonder what kids today would think about being forced to drink milk that had sat outside in the sun all morning and had half turned to cream? I also wonder what 'Rotten Boroughs' in Private Eye might have made of a diary owner with the contract to supply school milk sitting on the board of governors...?

To be honest, Shawcross seemed to be more of a dispute resolution process - polling different viewpoints from the rival camps and getting them to agree on an organisational structure that was mutually acceptable. In fact, it seems more a process by which the Provincial League promoters were able to kick out the people they didn't like from the existing governing structure. The report itself is written in typical non-committal lawyerly way and contains nothing revolutionary at all. It's something anyone could have come up with, including the promoters if they'd actually been willing to sit in a room together.

Under the 13 heat format, the best rider normally rode at No.1, the next best at 3 with the remaining heat leader at 5. You then normally had the best second string at 4, the other second string at 2, with the best reserve programmed at 7. To roughly determine the relative strength of opposition faced by each rider, you can assign 7 points to the opposing No.1, 6 to the No.3, 5 to the No.5, 4 to the No.4, 3 to the No.2, 2 to the No.7 and 1 to the No.6. So under the old 13 heat format, that gives you the following: No.3 - 8, 9, 10, 11 = 38 (37 when riding away) - meets the opposing No.1 and No.7/6 twice No.1 - 10, 7, 9, 11 = 37 (38 when riding away) - meets the opposing No.3 and No.5 twice No.5 - 9, 10, 7, 11 = 37 - meets the opposing No.1 and No.4 twice No.4 - 9, 10, 7, 11 = 37 - meets the opposing No.3 and No.5 twice No.2 - 10, 7, 5, 8 = 30 (31 when riding away) - meets the opposing No.2 twice + both reserves No.7 - 3, 5, 10 = 18 (16 when riding away)* No.6 - 3, 8, 9 = 20 (22 when riding away)* * NB, reserves only had 3 programmed rides The original 15 heat format merely added an extra reserves race, so brings the No.7 to 21(19) and the No.6 to 23(25) from their four programmed rides. Under the revised 15 heat format, the second heat leader tended to be programmed at No. 5, which gives you the following: No.1 - 10, 7, 10, 13 = 40 - meets the opposing No.1 and No.5 twice No.5 - 7, 10, 10, 13 = 40 - meets the opposing No.1 and No.5 twice No.3 - 9, 10, 7, 6 = 32 (33 when riding away) - meets the opposing No.3 and No.6/7 twice No.4 - 9, 10, 7, 6 = 32 (31 when riding away) - meets the opposing No.4 and No.6/7 twice No.2 - 10, 7, 5, 10 = 32 - meets the opposing No.2 twice + both reserves No.6 - 3, 10, 10, 6 = 29 (30 when riding away) No.7 - 3, 8, 5, 6 = 22 (21 when riding away) So under the old 13/15 heat format, the No.2 quite clearly has less strong opposition even before you take into account they're riding against their opposite number twice + both reserves. It's reasonable to argue there's much less in it under the more recent 15 heat format, although still facing slightly less strong opposition. However, if you actually did the same exercise calculated on the basis of the averages of the riders faced (which will differ from team to team), then I'd suggest the No.2 comes up against substantial weaker opposition on average. I think there's a degree of mythology in that, although unlike the other second-string, the No.2 effectively had to ride as heat leader in Heat 8 under the old 13/15-heat format. That was often where tactical or even double tactical substitutions were made by the opposition, and of course the No.2 was expected to support the No.1 rider. However, in reality riders often yo-yo'ed between the No.2 and No.7 positions. The No.7 would quite often find a bit of form through virtue of having easier rides at reserve, and then move into main body of the team where they ended-up at No.2 with tougher rides. So the No.7 would often be an in-form rider, whilst the No.2 would be an out-of-form rider.

Averages were never really pure anyway. The reserves met each other more often even in old versions of the heat format, and the No.2 position usually had relatively easier opposition as well.

The ACU existed before the FIM (and was indeed a founder member of the FIM) and would also continue to exist even if the FIM wasn't around. The FIM ultimately derives its authority from the national federations, rather than conferring authority on them, although it does of course have a role in recognising newly established federations. This is an important issue because it's about who ultimately has the authority to make and impose rules, not to mention what can be done with competition rights. More generally, I think it has been problematic that federations with little or no speedway involvement have been able to make decisions that affect professional speedway competitions, the CCP notwithstanding. That probably highlights a lot of the wider problems with speedway. I don't believe it would be exceptionally complicated. I didn't get involved in the recent discussions advocating a weighted average system, but years ago I worked out a generic system that could be used for any heat format because most heat formats have harder races for some riders than others. Once you have an agreed formula, then it's not really necessary for anyone to understand it, anymore than the average cricket fan knows how a Duckworth-Lewis target is calculated. I'd agree that if you don't automate this process from the beginning (basically with some sort of computer app), then it would be quite time consuming and error prone to have to go back and work out the relative rider weightings at particular times during the season. I could also well imagine that Peter Oakes didn't fancy going back over a season worth of programmes to update his averages either. Of course, by the time you've tinkered with all the averages in this way then they wouldn't really be averages anymore. They'd be more rider ratings. Averages are not really ideal for team building, but it's actually difficult to come up with a better system that would work in a speedway environment. For me, the issue is not so much the use of averages, but the way they've been used punitively to discourage any sort of longer term team building, meaning that success seems to be built on who can swing the right assessed averages. Cheque book speedway should be discouraged at all costs, but equally teams should be allowed to naturally develop up to a certain point, and not forced to be broken up merely for finishing in the top half of the table. There are ways in which this could be done, using averages and without the need for anyone to vote on lists.

It's not so much that it wouldn't be a good place to have a training track or hold grassroots meetings, but the long-term viability of the whole facility. It's unclear who if anyone is behind the funding of this, even though the UK government appears to throwing 125 million at the project. No-one denies that part of Wales needs re-generating, but building an unneeded race circuit in a remote area smacks of being an expensive white elephant even taking into account the motorsport 'business park'.

Or that's how it's been spun...

I think it's really that, or should be that the ACU and other national federations authorise the FIM, given the FIM is a membership organisation. Active promoters will inevitably have conflicts of interest (or at least accusations of such) which is problematic for a body that needs to be impartial. Bringing a promoters' perspective could be solved by nominating former promoters. There's generally been move in other sports towards having independent directors, even if they're actually nominated/elected by the teams. It's a sensible policy, doesn't preclude experienced people being involved, and improves the credibility of decision making - something speedway seriously lacks. And yet averages with all their anomalies have been religiously used for team building for many years. The other issue is one man's common sense is not always another man's, and when the assessments are not being made by an impartial body then question marks will always be raised. You could quite easily come up with fairly reflective rider 'averages' by weighting heats in different ways - I played with this years ago. Anomalies could be ironed out by factoring averages between the previous and current season, with the current season gaining increasing weight as more matches were ridden. I'd accept it would take a bit of work to calculate and wouldn't be entirely fathomable to the average spectator (and possibly promoter either), but is the methodology behind the heat leader list any more fathomable?

Well not that many years ago the RAC actually used to delegate motorcycle sport to the ACU, and appointed two members of the SCB. The BSPA had no direct involvement in the SCB at all, but when the RAC divested its motor sport arm to form the MSA, the BSPA saw the opportunity to kick out them out of the SCB and appoint their own members. There's nothing especially wrong with having BSPA nominees on the SCB, but they shouldn't be active promoters. That defeats the purpose of having a third party to deal with disciplinary procedures and appeals. Also not really sure what the ACU adds to all of it. Maybe provides independent safety and technical advice, but speedway is fairly removed from most other forms of motorcycling and so difficult to see the added value.

Would imagine the rules relating to track standards, equipment, officials, running of meetings, disciplinary and general organisational stuff falls within the remit of the SCB. The stuff relating to league format, team composition, guest facilities and averages is likely what the BSPA can edit with impunity.

I'm not so sure. It's in a something of a remote location and Wales already has three other race circuits, including two in South Wales. I know with respect to karting, the two existing tracks in Wales are struggling and needs competition like a hole in the head, and who'll be paying to bring all these premier events to the track? And if Newport speedway couldn't make a go of things, how would a track located some distance from major population centres expect to?

Reading speedway, Cardwonder, Sponsorship Manager, and possibly others. Since then there's been Dig Deep. I recall many on here expressing scepticism about Gaming International's plans at the time. Even the super casino idea was not approved, and I think a rational investor would seriously have to ask whether a company running a few dog tracks would ever have been a credible partner in a super casino. Never added up, even before the benefit of hindsight. My point was not really to analyse Postlethwaite's chequered business history though, but to highlight that he's the closest the sport has come to having an independent character bringing external investment from somewhere other than a transport company or car dealership, yet he wasn't really able to revolutionise the sport either, notwithstanding taking it to the Millennium Stadium. Yes, I know other indoor stadia can be cited, but GPs have not endured there and the domestic aspect of the sport remains as bad as it's ever been.

That was his big achievement, but on the back of who's money?

As I recall, he only qualified as reserve for the Intercontinental Final, but made it because Sam Ermolenko got injured in a longtrack meeting. He then only qualified as reserve for the World Final, but again got it in because Jan O. Pedersen crashed a go-kart or something. He had a pretty good year in 1989 though.

A supposedly astute businessman believed in promises from Gaming International? Even if it was going to happen, it would have been at least a couple of loss-making years away. I'm afraid running weekly speedway where you don't have pick of the plum dates or free access to the best riders is also a very different proposition to the SGP, even if you didn't have several other unsuccessful businesses to contend with.

Yes, because he was losing money at Reading and on other enterprises.

F1 was always associated with the rich and famous and glamour, and Bernie Ecclestone merely leveraged that. Barry Hearn took popular indoor pastimes with low setup costs whose participants were paid a pittance, and marketed them to television as cheap ways of filling airtime. Speedway has none of those advantages - expensive to run, easily affected by the weather, and not a sport followed by monied classes. So yes it needs an independent entrepreneur, but no independent entrepreneur would touch the sport with a bargepole because it represent a risky and most likely poor investment. John Postlethwaite was probably the closest the sport came in recent times, but even with F1 marketing experience and backing from a self-declared blue chip company, was not able to take speedway to anything approaching a major league sport.

There have been rumblings about doing a GP in the UAE in the past, and I think an ice speedway meeting (the mickey mouse imitation of ice racing) was held in Dubai some years ago. Can't really see the point of staging a meeting in a country with no tradition or interest in the sport though. Speedway needs to consolidate on its few remaining markets before going and promoting mickey mouse competitions in new places. And 'Champions League' competitions will always be mickey mouse whilst riders compete for multiple teams that may potentially all qualify for the competition. Even cricket woke up to this fact and scrapped the ridiculous T20 Champions League which was largely shunned by the fans for the farce it was. Spain may, and I stress may, potentially be a possibility for a GP. However, the economic crisis means there's probably less likelihood of a local authority sponsoring the hosting which would likely be necessary to make such a venture pay.

Sure, but the fault of paying more than the sport can afford is entirely that of the promoters. In what other walk of life would an employee turn round to their employer and say "I think I'm being paid too much, you should pay me less"? I don't buy into the "it's a dangerous sport" reasoning, but the reality is that most professional riders won't be making a great living by the time expenses are taken into account.