mikebv

The riders can ask for more money but they most likely won't get it... They will then have four options... Give up speedway and get another job.. Keep riding and get more sponsors.. Keep riding and ride in other countries.. Get a job alongside riding Speedway.. I would suggest giving up Speedway would be very much the last option for the vast majority.. There clearly isn't any "best option" for the sport given the state it has been allowed to end up in, just the "least worst"... Having a top league of so few teams won't engage too many to keep turning up In reality, what do they have to offer? At least a six figure increase in costs? Restricted race nights which most likely will actually reduce crowd levels given the change of nights? An increase in admission fees for the fans to pay the higher costs?.. A chance to put an uncompetitive team together as other teams have already sewn up the most wanted "top riders"... "Top riders" who, after any novelty wears off, won't make much of a difference (if any), to the crowd numbers anyway.... Not exactly a "winning formula" is it? There is a perfect example of which level is more suitable for the current UK issues... Oxford.. They had plenty of World Class riders in attendance last season. but have decided to drop the top tier and keep their second tier position...

Ahhhhhh.... But apart from those TEN GP's there isn't any more....

I kind of thought that could be the case.... Don't spoil it for me though.. Let me believe...

I am hoping that they have chosen this date deliberately as a genius bit of marketing... "A moment of sudden and great revelation or realisation"..... Am I expecting too much???

I have read it is the 6th... The Epiphany.... If so... How very apt....

I like the way you clarified the year...

Sod off! I'm getting an Aces Season Ticket for Christmas... Oh... Hang on.....

When well meaning enthusiasts who are happy to spend hundreds of thousands on their hobby get some independent leadership and administrative structure... And when the sport stops getting treated as a personal plaything and starts getting treated as a bona fide team sport by so many... And when £200k is shaved off the riders payments across the 80 or so riders, (on a % pro rata basis).. Riders, who are pretty much completely unknown outside the Speedway Bubble, and bring in hardly any extra bums on seats, and this money is then handed over to a marketing company who just might be able to get these riders recognised, (and more importantly the very sport itself), and bring a few more in.. Sadly, no chance of any of the above...

Putting fingers in their ears and going.... "Laaaa! Laaaa! Laaaa! Laaaa! I can't hear you!!!!

Glasgow.... To You, To Me, To Me, To You. Etc, etc etc... The seemingly unpalatable truth for some is that the level of the Premiership is clearly, and undeniably, untenable in the UK, for enough teams to make it viable and credible... A dead horse that some still seem to want to keep flogging.. As was shown last season, seven is two too many given the lack of riders of the level needed, and the cost of them, with the team in fifth being no real challenge for the top four.. Running with five or six teams makes little difference anyway to running with four teams when it comes to credibility and variety of clubs visiting.. Listening to the arguments for a Premiership is like listening to the Dead Parrot sketch in Month Python... "This league is no more. It has ceased to be. It has expired and gone to meet it's maker!"... Time to move on with "something else"... As. Whatever it may be, it has to be better than a non competitive top tier with so few teams... (Once Again)...

"'Arry's 'Ammers" at Oxford?

You can see why landlords sell up and developers move in can't you?

Don't even have riders as assets anymore...

But to be fair to them... Very consistent.... Years of decline hasn't waivered them one bit.... They have kept doing the same thing in the face of all the clear evidence, and feedback from thousands of disillusioned fans, for the need to do something radically different. . A special and rare talent....

No... It was cancelled last week due to the poor forecast...

Is Rachel from Accounts their Finance Director?

To be fair to fhem... Any AGM is usually only attended by shareholders and directors of the business... It has nothing at all to do with any customers of that business... It then is followed by an official statement as to the past year's performance of the business and, plans they may for the following year and beyond... Customers desperately wanting "bits" of information leading up to it, and during it, will just have to accept being disappointed, and wait until the official statement.....

Couldn't someone just open Swindon? They have a track and a stand and their old promoters don't seem to want to run the sport there...

A tenner to get in, all kids in for free... Sorted... The way forward... Me and my lad will be there.... (If they ran on Friday's or Saturdays, depending on when Ben and Zach C are needed in Poland..)...

There must be hundreds, maybe even thousands, like you, Chris... Especially in London given the amount of tracks there used to be.. Maybe the BSP should set up a national website for car sharing should anyone be gong to meetings? Coventry, Swindon, Peterborough, Wolves, Somerset, Lakeside, Rye House, Newcastle, Cradley, Eastbourne, Birmingham, and all the closed London tracks, must still have fans interested in the sport, but only have public transport to visit tracks further afield, or do have cars, but don't fancy the costs of the journey... It may encourage those with cars to visit the tracks still running more frequenly if they could split the fuel costs...

He could go teaching maths....

And are only ever one major benefactor away from not affording to run their business... It's often quoted on here that the "top riders" get some, if not all, their salary paid for by key sponsors... If ever there was something built on sand then this is it.... Sponsors money should really be some icing on the cake, not a huge part of the cake itself...

Mark Lemon in the Speedway Star article seemed quite adamant there would be three leagues.. Regardless of TV deal or not, and track numbers... He talked about "ideal" numbers but it did appear that if they had to go with five, and no TV contract, then they would... Home and Away three times I presume, with three teams getting a bye to the KO Cup semis, with two holding a "quarter final"...? Without that "top league" the 30+ riders who DU'd last year could be seriously out of pocket... With many losing their highest income stream.. Who will have to fill that black hole in their finances? Their ONE club?

To be fair... Promoters expect riders to have two good bikes, even at NDL level, and to be available on "stand by" to guest at a moments notice whenever needed ... Pretty much expecting them to be professional riders.. And it's the promoters that have meant doubling up is now a "must do", due to their lack of development of UK riders to create a greater supply than demand over the past two decades.. And all to win competitions that have so little reward and recognition... What a truly ludicrous system!!!!l

If only four other riders in the league have over an eight point average he could possibly increase his own... He did get a few "gimmes" when Becker was out, but he would have faced the other five eight point riders very often in Ht 13 and Ht 15... With one less to race this year I can see him again having a good season... (If there is a season for the top tier!!)