mikebv

Agreed.... Those "magical nights" I grew up with at Hyde Rd, with thousands in attendance, (often including 100's of away fans), simply wouldn't have happened the same if they had ran on Mondays or Thursdays... The honourable exception being the KO Cup Final v Reading on a Wednesday night where over 20000 were in attendsnce... Amazing to think that UK competitions could actually get those types of crowds in those days..

Financial suicide... And the track itself looks "very oval" which doesn't make for great racing in today's modern era of machinery...

Just another track that got bigger crowds at weekend when the majority of the country has its leisure time... Regardless of who turned up to race....

Do you mean.... The most obvious, credible thing to do? Never catch on that.

Credibility of the Leagues? Outcome Jeopardy for the majority of meetings? Meetings not being arranged already knowing riders will be missing, (usually the biggest riders who attract the most fans)..? A joined up, well funded, collective, national marketing strategy? Clubs doing their own YouTube "magazine" channels? An admission fee in keeping with what is actually on offer? A huge national well planned and executed promotion of the sport targeting schools and local kids groups and kids sports teams? All kids in for free to hopefully grow the sports future? Kids clubs set up at each track to maintain communication with them and thier families? Running on nights when you can bring those kids without them having school the next day? Or? A new helmet colour, but not a Green one this time?

Extenuating circumstances that night though Iain... So let's be fair... That FIFTH Leicester guest in the 2nd meeting was unavoidable.... Sadly, it was time to stop taking UK Speedway seriously as a "proper" team sport, about two decades ago.... The GP's and other FIM competitions started to grow, and maintaining your place in a Polish team started to take up many rider's focus and priority... This resulted in guestfest after guestfest, particularly at weekends, as riders pursued their own individual ambitions... With these riders usually being the "big names" and the largest beneficiaries of "the Sky money"... UK promoters, knowing these riders would be missing, still insisted on putting out League racing though... I remember one night at Lakeside, the Aces went there with four guests (Arena track ringers) and RR due to a national championship, and GP qualifiers, taking place around Europe... I was staying in Canary Wharf that weekend and would have gone until I saw the line up... You simply couldn't then, nor (particularly in the internet age), even more so now, take team speedway seriously in the UK... Which is a shame as the raw product is still very sellable.... But, only if the infrastructure underpinning it made more sense, and had more credibility and jeopardy... They desperately need a "Big Sponsor" to ensure a "Big Prize Fund" as that naturally will get interest from the wider UK public and media.. However. You have to doubt that ever happening unfortunately given its operating model is so open to ridicule.... What we have, and have had for probably the best part of two decades now, is probably pretty much "all there is", as surely those running the sport must have seen the decline in crowds as easily as the fans who still attend have... But, given not much seems to have changed when radical change was clearly needed, nor even researched as to why so many who still follow the sport, no longer attend, you can only presume all is thought "OK" at the high table and "same old/same old" remains the order of the day... Roll on next March eh?

You can also have the "best rider in the race" who will start odds on, deliberately coming in behind his own team mate to keep his average down, but pick up the same points money... Ahem! Of course, I meant "shepherding" a less experienced colleague around for the good of the team.....

Gerhard did well....

So where are the bikes? Must be useful for something... And Jon Cook did a pretty good job in targeting MX... I remember a Speedway Star interview with him where he basically was targeting MX riders with his selling point being that a "decent" Speedway rider could (at that time), ride three or four times a week and earn over four grand..

It was (and still is), a tiny sport, so why there was this obsession to ensure "the stars" stayed riding over here was beyond me... I can only presume it was more "promoter ego" that wanted the best in the world working for them.. There is no "pot of gold" in winning any UK competition, and hardly anyone out of 80 million people will even know who won what, so I can only think rubbing shoulders with the worlds best must be what many Div 1 promoters were in it for.. Many, many, millions given to them, and all to regress... Absolutely barmy...

It was discussed a few years ago... The plan, if I remember correctly, was for any rider in two or three teams to ride for the team in his own nation. Eg if he was Danish he rode for his Danish team, with the other teams he rode for bringing in a guest... Riders such as Aussies would ride for the team in the country they first appeared in... It never got past the discussion stage it appears....

An Acca.....

You could bet on how many guests turn up in a play off semi final.,. My money is on three.... Japan's version of the sport is set up just for betting.... #justsaying.....

Didnt the BSP buy a load of those GTR bikes? If so, why not just use them for dozens of practice days and see if anyone with ability turns up... MX seems to be a decent breeding ground as it appears Grasstrack no longer looks like the pathway...

According to one promoter... "The No 1's".... Who all then pretty much effed off to Poland and Sweden as soon as the UK gravy train ended for them.. Personally I wasnt ever convinced bringing "the top stars" back a few years ago was going to be a "Golden Ticket" given the fact that when pretty much every single top rider (maybe apart from Tomaz Gollob), rode over here week in, week out, during the "Sky years", the crowds didn't grow, in fact, they kept declining overall... Which suggested the "top names" were not deal breakers as to whether fans were attending or not... Plymouth is a perfect example of where "the cast of the production" hasn't changed, yet the number of people now watching them has increased considerably, just by changing their "opening hours", which are now obviously more aligned to people's leisure time...

The UK had over TWENTY MILLION quid from Sky alone... That's a fair old "subsidy".... Yet, here we are with the current situation...

Are those people waiting for the usual Free Palestine demonstration?

It would be interesting to see what would happen if they said, as of tomorrow, everyone rides for the same money as the UK pay out.... The riders would be in meltdown and asking for much more from the UK and Sweden..!!! Imagine the UK promoters reaction then? And it isn't really their fault that the UK and Sweden haven't developed their own leagues and riders.... Both leagues have set race nights, with the Swedes still using the same night they ran on when they got many more punters in the Trick era... And, the UK initially used Monday, Wednesday and Thursday as their TWO nights where they had priority.... .. The fact is both the UK and Sweden have brought in journeymen after journeymen from abroad which took away many hundreds of chances for their own riders to race... Whilst the Poles ensured they developed their own riders by ring fencing positions for them.. I would actually think the Poles may have looked at how the UK has ran the sport since the early 80's and used that as template NOT to follow under any circumstances whatsoever... In fact. Doing exactly the opposite would become their operating model....

Its clear from the interview that the FIM are not held in any regard whatsoever by the Poles.. They do believe that they subsidise the rest of world speedway... Which, to be fair to them, they certainly do to a large extent... The £400k (and quite often much more) that the top riders get does enable them to ride for much less in other leagues, and put together their GP set ups...

It would be just like watching Justin Elkins all over again....

When they pay out six figure signing on fees, and then two grand a point, I can see their view....

An interview with Rafal Dobrucki in this weeks excellent Speedway Star tells you all you need to know about the psyche of those who run Speedway in Poland... "Poland provides the livelihood of the sport" being just one of his comments... "Poland speedway effectively sponsors the entire World Championship" being another... Got to say, the Speedway Star, whilst always being a good read, has really dialled up the levels in the past 12 months or so with it's features....

Fantastic interview with Gerry Facenna in the (ever excellent), Speedway Star... He mentions how successful the "Trust The Fans" mechanic has been in driving up crowds... Many years ago I mentioned to a promoter the very same idea of letting his fans bring someone in for free for three matches to see if they could be enticed to keep attending, with my rationale being "these people are not there now", so "no loss".... Never mind spitting his tea out, he nearly spit his dentures out!!!! His answer was "some will just take the p**s and come in for nothing"... I said that that was obviously a distinct possibility but if you explained it well enough, given the loyalty of Speedway fans, not that many would, and the possible long term rewards far outweighed any short term risk... It didn't happen and his crowds continued to drop....... Nice to see some promoters actually promoting... Best of luck to Glasgow...

They don't spend five figure sums on their "kit".... That is the stumbling block for the sport... And then to recoup that amount (and much more to justify doing this "job"), riders then have to be available seven days a week to travel around Europe and ride, often with minimal notice should a "guest" opportunity suddenly turn up in the UK, or a team spot, or individual meeting invite, abroad.. The promoters pretty much expect the riders to be "fully professional" and then completely undermine this logic, and expectation, by running the sport the way they do... That is to say, running it against all the rudimentary basic principles you would expect from a professional team sport... The sport, in the UK, sadly, has so much now to unpick that it probably never will be able to do it...

And Darts and Snooker.....