G the Bee

I'd rather take a few long distance plane trips, sipping a few beers and watching a few movies whilst looking forward to my holiday than sit in a car in a traffic jam on the motorway, but perhaps I'm strange like that! People aren't complaining, just stating a fact. The date chosen seems strange for a number of reasons: School holidays and people being on their annual holidays as a result Bank holiday weekend Bank holiday traffic Football season having started But, as another poster stated, BSI would have been aware of these issues and still chose the date they did. I suspect it may have been the only viable date that fitted in with the stadium's availablilty and the agreements they already have in place with other SGP venues. I also think the gate will be down, but only time will tell. Perhaps having it during bank holiday weekend will be a masterstroke.

A valuable contribution in stating the obvious!

If this is true, I also must question the wisdom of holding this event during the school summer holidays, and to go for August Bank Holiday weekend seems even more strange. Many people will be on their annual holidays over that week and the traffic on the roads during August bank holiday weekend is horrendous. Cardiff has limited hotel capacity and they are always booked solid for GP weekend in June, so many people are going to have to brave the holiday traffic for this one. Would have been lovely, just for once, to have had Cardiff as the final GP of the season. I know BSI have to work around stadium availability etc but to see the world champion crowned at Cardiff would have been a great 'thank you' gesture to all of the British fans who have supported the Cardiff GP over the past 11 years. Perhaps BSI have already signed a contract elsewhere for the final GP of 2012.

Thanks Mateusz, I never considered he might be a reserve! Am used to seeing Polish reserves in Heat 1 (because that's where they ride in Ekstraliga I presumed it would be the same). Thought Shamek was Pila's number 1 (which seemed logical when he went out in heat 2 - because the Ekstraliga number ones do!). Can't believe he is even riding in Liga 2, never mind as a reserve! Cheers.

Ok, here's one for some of our Polish friends or perhaps anyone else a little more 'in the know'. I've been watching the Pila Liga 2 meeting updates on Sportowefakty and I can't work out what is going on with Shamek Pawlicki. He seemed to take a 5:1 with Piotr in his first programmed ride and then seems to appear for the rest of his rides up until heat 14 as replacements for other riders. Yet no other programmed rides appear for him between heats 2-14 He then took a ride in Heat 14 (with no replacement noted next to his name on the update screen). Am I going mad? Here is the link: http://live.sportowefakty.pl/launch_speedway_2845.html

Yes, so here's another. Coventry's meeting with Lakeside will now be minus Edward Kennett, Lee Richardson and Stuart Robson. So Cov may be forced to line up with a guest for their number 1 and rider replacement for their number 2 whilst Lakeside use a guest for ex. Coventry Lee Richardson and a weaker rider at reserve than the ex. Coventry rider they would probably have used. I can see the crowds flocking to Brandon for this one! In my opinion running two of these meetings is a waste of time and I suspect they do not exist to ensure as many riders as possible get a chance to qualify for the British Final but rather as a little money spinner for the BSPA and staging track who hope that predominantly Premier League supprters will come flocking to Sheffield and Scunthorpe to see Harris, Nicholls, Richardson, Kennett, Woffinden, Stead and Bridger (riders they seldom get a chance to see). Certainly Britain does not have the depth of talent to justify two of these meetings. Why riders like Harris, Nicholls, Kennett, Woffinden etc are forced to do them is beyond me. This meeting can only be a potential banana skin for these riders who already have a hectic fixture list. If they don't make it through their semi (which would probably only happen due to mechanical issues or injury) it seriously de-values the British Final. Like the farcical situation last year when we had a British Final run at Wolverhampton without Tai Woffinden - our second British GP rider at the time - because his semi-final was rained off before the meeting had run its course and he had an engine failure in his second of three rides). Seed the eight top-averaged GB riders direct to the British Final and run one qualifier right at the beginning of the season for the next top 16 in the averages. That way, anyone in the top 24 of British riders gets a shot of riding in the British Final and fixture disruption is kept to a minimum.

I agree with the general consensus here. It's not acceptable to keep the fans standing around for practically three hours in the cold to watch 22 heats of speedway. I don't know if it's the fault of the Coventry promotion, the referee or a combination of both but, in my opinion, there often seems to be a lack of urgency to get through a meeting at Coventry. You would have thought the referee would have been instructed to get through the meeting as quickly as possible due to the constant threat of rain. The meeting should have been run on GP lines, with the riders in the next heat lined up in the pits on their bikes whilst the current heat took place. Then, as soon as all riders returned safely to the pits, the two minutes should have been put on straight away. This meeting should have been done and dusted by around 10 -10:15pm. One heat every five minutes. It finished at five to eleven! The slow pace of the meeting ruined what could have been a decent night.

Well I think it's great Hans Nielsen has been tempted out of retirement to ride in this meeting Check out the actual rider list in the advert in this week's Speedway Star! First name, bottom row. Just need Olsen (not Jacob) and Knudsen added now!

I've got to be honest, I was hoping this meeting would be back at Poole. One of the reasons being that we can justify making a weekend of it at Poole, wheras Newport is just an hour and a half's drive away. That said, I suppose it's only right and proper that it goes back to its spiritual home at Newport. I have attended every NYC since the 2004 staging and have to say that the Poole event was the best one I have ever seen. The meeting had plenty of action and a top quality field. 20 races and a final with a full field of 16 riders. And it didn't take forever to get through the meeting either! Perhaps I am mistaken but previous NYC's at Newport seemed to be very drawn out affairs. I said on leaving the Poole event last year that the Poole promotion raised the bar in relation to this meeting and if Newport got it back they should try to emulate Poole's running of this meeting as much as possible. Please no 12 rider field with that annoying (but I suppose unaviodable) race format.

We've been to Prague for the last two years. Enjoyed every time and want to go again this year. Not sure what we paid last year but two years ago we paid 580czk to stand (plus a 30czk booking fee). Don't think it was much more in czk to stand last year but obviously it worked out more because the pound had fallen so much against the Koruna. We book on line through Ticketstream (as I think you have to) and had no problems. Work out the prices this year! The stadium has many more seats now and the cheapest ones appear to be 950.00czk. I can only book them online through Ticketstream.cz with a credit card (like I do every year). My credit card company are giving me approx 27.68czk to the pound, making the price of a ticket around £34-35. There is a cheaper price available of 700.00czk but I think this is for standing as the colour code it relates to isn't available. No problem with standing as we have stood for the last two years, except you cannot appear to buy standing tickets on line. They are only available on the day, which presents problems: The flight we want doesn't get into Prague until Saturday afternoon. If there are only a limited amount of standing tickets for sale (as much of the old standing area is now seating) I don't want to run the risk of the standing tickets all being gone by the time we get to the stadium. It looks like the only standing area is now the second bend. It used to be the whole of bend 2 plus the back straight. I know the poor exchange rate is a massive factor, but the price we may pay for tickets this year will be around double what I recall we paid two years ago! Two years ago you were getting around 40czk to the pound. My GP tickets in 2007 cost around £15-£16! Even with seating, the Marketa Stadium is hardly Cardiff, but it will work out more expensive to get a seat there! Not sure I am going to let the fact that my ticket price has doubled stop me going but if the other people I want to go with don't fancy the extra cost, we might have to knock it on the head.

A fantastic meeting. Great entertainment with a field of fully committed riders who were very evenly matched. I have attended the New Year Classic every year since 2004 and I have not commented on the Poole / Newport debate over this year's meeting, trying to keep an open mind prior to the meeting itself. But now I have returned from the meeting I feel more qualified to comment. I have no affiliation with either Newport or Poole so my comments are objective. I have always enjoyed the New Year Classic in years gone by but, put simply, the standard of racing, quality of riders and presentation on offer made this the best New Year Classic I have been to. Yes it was dusty early on and the track was slick, but it didn't affect the racing or the viewing so it didn't cause particular problems. One thing I was not unhappy to see the back of was the 12 rider field that seemed to always be part and parcel of the Newport event. The traditional 16 rider formula works much better. Whatever happens to this meeting in the future, Poole have set the standard for other New Year meetings to follow.

The Burnup appears to have been rained off. See separate thread http://www.speedway-forum.co.uk/forums/ind...showtopic=45173 and on the grasstrack.net forum http://members.boardhost.com/Grasstracknet...1225541620.html however TMMCC website http://www.tmmcc.co.uk/index_main.html still has not been updated.

I tell you what's annoying. Going for a weekend to Burnham-on-Sea. Going round the pubs on Saturday afternoon trying to get someone to put the speedway on. Finding a pub who are happy to show it. Then, getting into a conversation with some drinkers in the pub about how they went to Somerset once and found speedway (for want of a better word) boring. I explained how Somerset has a reputation for good racing and that, just like any sport there were good meetings and bad ones. I suggested they gived Somerset another chance, and also that they watched a little of the GP to show how exciting speedway could be. Didn't I feel stupid.

Meeting off. Just confirmed.

For Bydgoszcz I thought this was a pretty poor GP. This track is widely regarded as the best in the world, with multiple racing lines, so it was very disappointing to see riders in the main sticking, pretty much to one line. It seemed that unless you were Gollob, moving of the line meant you went backwards. As for the Brits, I thought Bomber gave a good account of himself on his first visit to Bydgoszcz. Not an easy track to visit for the first time and yet he still went into his last ride with an outside chance of making the semis. Who would have thought this would have been the case at the start of the season? Nicholls looked slow (as he has done in many GP's this year). Not an excuse but a fact. Why this should be the case, given his GP experience, is beyond me. We had Havelock on Sky saying they were struggling for a set-up. Is it me, or does it seem that in most GP's we hear the Nicholls camp saying they are struggling for a set-up? So overall, a disappointing night.

That's great news, Brighton is a cracking day out and and we have been for the last five years or so. However, the emphasis lately has changed from being a a day at the speedway with a visit to Brighton thrown in to a Christmas day out in Brighton with some speedway thrown in. This is because the event was becoming a little tired in my opinion and big names have been somewhat lacking recently. However, the change of format, together with the addition of a few 'names' should give the event the little 'boost' it needs. Good luck to Jon and Martin. I hope the change of format and rebranding works for them as the close season would be much duller without this event. Looking forward to it already.

That's the problem with rules - they are all open to interpretation. 'Proceeding' does not mean 'riding' and gives no indication of the speed in which one needs to 'proceed'. At a basic level it just means 'carry on' and Bomber was doing that. Dictionary definitions of proceed include - 'Travel onward', 'continue', 'to follow a course'. Bomber was doing all of these things. He was continuing with / traveling onward in the process of completing his race, with his bike under power when the race was stopped. The fact that he was not sat on the bike whilst it was under power, or not moving forward at speed, seems largely irrelevant. As does the fact that he fell while proceeding with his race. Certainly if you look at the issue of intent - it is clear Bomber intended to proceed in the race and would have been able to had the race not been stopped. Another definition of proceed is 'to renew motion or action, as after rest or interruption'. This applies directly in this case. Bomber kept the bike running and was in the process of renewing his motion or action when the race was stopped. If the word was 'riding' then there could be no issue as Bomber certainly wasn't riding under power when the race was stopped. But, in my opinion he was certainly 'proceeding'. If he had stalled the bike he could not have been proceeding under power either. But he kept the bike running. So there you go. Still think the exclusion was harsh but, at the end of the day it didn't have any bearing on his superb achievement by the end of the meeting.

But riders don't get excluded for letting tac subs through or to enable themselves to get bonus points. If they did, Billy Janniro would be excluded all the time! Surely 'under power' means the bike is 'under power' ie running. Now I'll be honest and say I don't have a rulebook, so if someone could come up with the actual definition of under power from the rulebook and explain to me why Chris was not deemed as under power I will gladly conceed this argument. I freely admit, my argument is based on my interpretation of the phrase as I don't own a rule book. To me, a rider sliding off, keeping the clutch in and getting set to continue his race is 'under power'. It happens all the time. Steve - He was getting up, ready to continue racing having not left contact with his bike once. It was a pretty tame fall. That's why I think his exclusion was uncalled for. Had Lindgren not fell off, Bomber would have been able to continue. Is your interpretation of the phrase under power based on sound knowledge of the rulebook or, like mine, a personal interpretation of what the phrase 'under power' must mean?

On what grounds Steve? A whim perhaps? I have looked at it many times on Sky and Bomber keeps the bike running. He rides across the bottom of the screen seconds after the red lights were on so surely he didn't have time to bump start his machine. Therefore he was under power at the time of the stopage. A stopage which was caused not by his fall, but by Lindgren's. Had the race not been stopped because of Lindgren's fall, Chris would have been able to continue his race. This opportunity was denied him when Lindgren and Batchelor had their incident.

I suggest you look at it again on Sky then, because your definition of 'in a heap on the track' is totally different to mine. Bomber never parts company with his machine. Both hands stay on the bars and he keeps it running. Bomber is clearly seen riding across the bottom of the screen whilst Lindgren is in the process of retrieving his bike, only a few seconds after he actually fell off! Have you never seen a rider fall off, keep the bike running and remount? That's what Bomber did. If the race was stopped after Batchelor laid it down (about the same time as Lindgren hit the fence) then the stoppage was nothing to do with Bomber as Batchelor laid down to avoid Lindgren. Batchelor was on a completely different line to Bomber and was not affected at all by his crash. I am in no doubt at all that had Lindgren and Batchelor not had their incident, the race would not have been stopped. Look at the time the referee gave Topinka and Nicholls to clear the track after their falls. So long as Bomber kept the bike running and was in a position to remount and carry on with his race at the time of the stoppage (caused by Lindgren and Batchelor's incident) then he should have been allowed to continue.

I think the referee got this completely wrong. Only Lindgren should have been excluded. Just watched the replay on Sky. Bomber and Lindgren fall within a second of each other, Bomber just before Lindgren. Bomber maintains contact with his bike and keeps the clutch in to keep the bike under power. If this had been the only incident, there would have been no cause for the referee to stop the race as Bomber didn't impede anyone and was perfectly able to remount and carry on or clear the track in a safe amount of time. However, Lindgren, when he falls, parts company with his bike and pulls out the cut-out. Batchelor lays the bike down to avoid Lindgren. The ref puts the lights on when Lindgren hits, or is about to hit, the fence. I'm not convinced that had the Lindgren and Batchelor incident not happened the ref would have stopped this. As the camera is on Lindgren, Bomber can be seen riding round the track having remounted. Lindgren was the primary cause of the stopage and Bomber was under power, albeit on the deck or in the process of remounting when the ref stopped it. A poor decision in my opinion. I'm just glad it had no bearing on the actual result!

My opinion for what it's worth. Very disappointed with the withdrawals from this meeting. As I've stated before, reasons could well have been genuine, but would the same riders who withdrew from the meeting done so if it had been a GP? However, the only rider I genuinely missed was Crump as all of the other big hitters (N. Pedersen, Andersen, Adams were there). I, along with many other fans at the meeting were disgusted with the state of the track for the first five races. Simply not good enough. The price to get in (£20) was already too high, so to be served up the farce of heats 1-5 was a joke. Regarding the withdrawal of Lee Richardson. Perhaps I'm being harsh, as I don't know the entire story, but my initial thought is that he should be heavilly fined and given a one meeting ban. Breaking down en-route is not an acceptable reason for missing a meeting. If I break down, I call the RAC and someone comes out and fixes the problem or tows me to where I need to go. Admittedly, this takes time, but he should have set out for the meeting in ample time. He let his fans down by not turning up. I know if I had got to the meeting and heard that excuse from either Bomber, Rory or Scott I would have been furious (as I was with Billy Janniro when he missed the Craven Shield meeting at Poole last season with the same problem). Credit to Buster Chapman for being bold enough to admit he had made a mistake with the track. It was sorted out very well and produced a good meeting thereafter. The meeting after heat 5 was very entertaining. Lots of passing and the riders were giving plenty of effort. I don't think Iversen, Screen and Zagar were missed as their replacements (Shields, Topinka and McGowan did a good job) although I was disappointed with Lindgren for Karlsson which I considered pretty much a like-for-like swap bearing in mind Lindgren's form recently. Bomber, once again, was total class. His effort and commitment are a credit to him. He has raced Friday (GP Practice), Saturday (GP), Sunday (Poland), Monday (Cov), Tuesday (Sweden), Wednesday (Denmark), Thursday (ELRC). He races again tonight for Coventry. Yet there he was last night, giving 100% from his first heat to his last. I genuinely feel, as I have since seeing his early days at Brandon, that he has the ability to be World Champion. Yesterday evening was another affirmation that on a track you can race on, Bomber is as good as any other rider out there at the moment.

This is pretty pathetic isn't it! All riders with apparently genuine reasons for pulling out and yet one can't help but wonder how many of them would have pulled out if it had been a GP. Once this meeting was the most prestigious meeting in the world after the world final. Now, it seems as if it is just another fixture to the riders in an already crowded fixture list. If there was a real and strong 'desire' for riders to ride in the meeting, as there is in the GP's, would we have seen so many withdrawals? I wonder how many more will pull out before tonight? Where is Andreas Jonsson? Is he not fit? Why is he not representing Lakeside? Was he asked? I most certainly hope he was! Will the price be reduced to reflect the watered-down line up? No Crump is a huge loss.

Someone summed it up brilliantly when they said something along the lines of, Poland will do the business if the final is in Poland and will struggle if the final is elsewhere. Last year they didn't even get through the race-off at Reading. Amused at Steve Shovlar distancing anyone in Team GB with a Poole connection from last nights performance. I would be the first to put my hand up and say I was extremely disappointed with the performance of the two Coventry Brits. Even though Scott showed glimpses of form, they could have, and should have, done better. Kennett was on a learning curve, true, but he was still beaten by riders who you would have thought he might beat (Watt and Holder). It was clear to me from the first set of heats that our riders machines were not quick enough. Nothing to do with riders not being good enough. I doubt there were many riders in that field who have not been beaten by any of the Team GB riders over the course of this season. Now, I'm not saying that we had a winning team on paper, far from it, but we all know each one of our riders should be capable of picking up more points against the likes of Iversen, Bjerre, Holder, Watt and Sullivan. We looked like a team who had equipment which was unprepared for track conditions and riders who didn't know how to ride it. Surely the Team Manager has a degree of responsibility here. Otherwise, what's the point of him being there? Anyone with a little speedway knowledge can pick 6 riders and decide where to use a Joker!

I think you are doing Bomber a huge disservice Steve. Let's face it, how many on here were expecting Chris to struggle to score against everyone but the wild-card on Saturday night. I also feel that if it had been Edward Kennett's GP debut, and Kennett had produced the same performance and finished one point off the semi's (remember, Chris was little more than half a bike length from making the semi's, because had he passed Hampel in heat 14 he would have been through) then you would have been virtually gushing with praise. You say he didn't do anything, yet he was able to pass both Jonsson and Bjarne Pedersen in two of his rides (although passing Bjarne seems to be almost routine for Chris at the moment!). Furthermore, he scored more than a lot of riders who are vastly more experienced at the top level. So credit where credit is due I say. I'm sure you will point to Lindback as an example of how to make a GP debut, but performances like that are usually the exception to the rule. After yesterday's performance from Lindback, I know who I'd rather be right now!