jeff...

No necessarily, the wildcard is a rider the organisers feel will be beneficial to attracting a healthy crowd, Was not Jason Crump once a wildcard for the British GP

Stuart Shirley

Poland has thousands more speedway fans than the UK and could probably fill the 3 Polish GPs without any travelling fans or expecting the same people to attend each one. In Britain that isn't the case, in fact Cardiff probably attracts more support than the British Leagues could muster combined. As such another British GP would be suicidal, one would compromise the other, the foreign contingent, the once a year fans etc would pick one or the other. Cardiff as a stand alone British GP attracts 40,000 plus. I would think 2 GPs in Britain would be luck to attract 50,000 total. And you are right the racing this year has been, in the main, dire. So much so I have almost given up on them. That said a piss poor GP still provides ten times more entertainment than a good league match

Why not run an Elite League of 10 maybe 12 teams, half racing on a Monday, half on a Thursday. Shorten the season considerably, lets say 01st April to Sept 30th Each team will ride at home each week giving every team 2 matches a week. The new Elite League will operate as one entity with an agreed pay scale strictly adhered to and each teams gate receipts being pooleed and shared equally. This modern trend of rain offs would be addressed, unless heavy rain was falling at the time matches would go ahead. 3 or 4 dates could be set aside throughout the season to accomodate rained off matches, maybe even go a step further and come up with a means of contriving a result should a match not take place and not rearrange it at all. Teams that cant operate within those parameters to be discarded to operate in a lower league. Or alternatively just come up with more reasons why none of this can be done asnd carry on as normal with the spectre of trying to maintain turnover from less and less fans continuing

OK in the face of general opinion I apologise, will stick him on ignore, that way he will not wind me up

Norman I disagree with many people but respect their opinions, Derek is so one eyed that the bile he comes out with isn't worthy of any other response. He has some hare brained notion that Hancock let Harris past in the 2007 final, and yet I could cite hundreds of similar last, or first, bends in World Finals where a rider has attempted to block an outside run only for the chasing rider to change direction and ride by. Equally because Hancock is smiling on the rostrum seems to prove he didn't care about winning, but with a few exceptions, all World Final rostrums were of smiling riders. No I am afraid Derek is no more than a fool who understands little about racing. You're OK though!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In the case of Derek it is highly appropiate

I had considered posting something about how much of a fool you really are but it is sufficient to merely highlight your last post and you have done it for me

When I asked the question "are you really as stupid as your posts suggest"? I didnt expect you would answer in the affermative in your very next post.

Do you actually understand anything about racing at all. Are you really as stupid as your posts suggest or are you on one long wind up, either way you only serve to make yourself look more and more stupid with each passing post. PS are you still struggling with the concept of family trees yet or have you grasped that two "unrelated" people are not two generations of the same family.

Sky are business people, not sports fanatics. They would happily show snails racing up the garden path if it attracted 10s or even hundreds of thousands to watch it. High viewing figures mean premium advertising space. While the viewing figures for the GPs remain high, and they are, along with the perfect formula for TV with lots of natural ad breaks then the GPs will remain on Sky. The red button debate is of course complete nonsense, it is simply a matter of pressing a button, it makes no difference at all. If people are taping the event then clearly they are not bothered about watching live so simply tape a later showing of the event

Are you trying for the most idiotic post then? If so that one puts you top of the leaderboard

They are "decided on the track, one way or another" Why do you think Tai Woffinden is going to be in? because he has a nice name!. He will be in because of his performances "on the track". That and the fact all the other Brits are crap

Next years series will likely contain 20 year old Emil Sayfutinov, 19? year old Tai Woffinden and 22 year old Freddie Lindgren. Hardly indicative of the old boys club that some would have you believe is it

You are struggling with this aren't you, the top eight are not seeded anymore than the top eight in the old Inter Continental Final were seeded. It seems to have escaped your attention but the top eight qualify by being in the top eight. A place earned, not given. Then we have the three who qualify via the challenge so now we are up to 11 that have legitimately qualified. 1 place is kept open for a wild card position with the other 4, yes only 4, being seeded riders. Ever heard the saying, "sometimes it is better to say nothing and have people think you a fool than say something and confirm it". very apt is it not?

It is you who has it wrong my friend, in the individual world championship a competitor represents the country that issues his racing license. In the World Cup a rider may only represent the country who issue his passport

Zenon Plech, Edward Jancarz, Marek Cieslak & Jerzy Rembas were all seeded to the 1976 world final. Slawomir Drabik was seeded straight to the 92 Final. Ryszard Dolomisiewicz was the seed in 86 As far as I recall in 76 those 4 poles didn't take part in the qualification system but Drabik & Dolomisiewicz certainly did and failed to qualify Wonder when Derek will be back cap in hand to apologise for stating none of this ever happened!!!!!!!

Even though such seedings were prevalent at the time the USA had no such luxury when staging the world final in LA. As it happened (and how it happened is of course another story) they had 3 finalists and the event still bombed, although only by the standards of the day because it still had 30,000 plus attending, how many paid is another matter

No Jan Anderrson won the Swedish Final which quaified him direct to the final, the 4 next placed riders continued the qualification process via the Nordic Final

Seeding in one form or another existed right throughout the championships. The Swedes had five guaranteed places in the 1974 Final, the brits had 4 in 1978. Admittedly a qualyfying process was used to determine these places but it wasn't the open qualifying system that Derek seems to think. The problem with open qualifying was evident at the 1976 and 1982 World Team Cup Finals, no home riders = no crowd

But according to Derek it never happened Jim! They were not the only ones by the way

Really, you dont go back in the sport as far as I do but I suggest you research that fact

You need to check your history before making silly statements, plenty of riders were seeded to the later stages of the championship and some even to the final itself

QUOTE (Stevie b @ Sep 14 2009, 01:53 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Phillip, I understand what you say about how the GPs are appreciated in other countries and yes we may have a different take on them in this country. However a worrying aspect on Sky on Saturday was Keith Hewens comments that the track conditions are possibly bringing the sport into disrepute. Interesting to see you say that Ole Olsen does not have as much say in track preperation as most people seem to think. That's as maybe, the fact remains that Saturday was not the first time a rider has made the same comment as Zager. If my memory serves me right it was at Lesno in the World Team Cup and it was Leigh Adams. I am not able to quote verbatim but it went along these lines, he said that the track is very different tonight and there is nothing you can do about it and shrugged his shoulders. He usually says something like it's the same for all of us and we just have to get on with it, difficult to relate on here but his body language on the night spoke volumes. I for one would miss Sky's coverage, I can even put up with Mr Millard repeatedly telling me Holta is on a polish Licence. ok only just. As others have suggested Sky may walk away, I hope they don't Sky are only concerned in high viewing figures, high figures equates to a premium rate for the ad breaks, so while they may not care what crap is being shown once that crap makes viewers start to turn off the GP speedway will be no more

1983 was sort of between eras, Penhall had gone, Olsen, Mauger, Collins etc were well past there sell by dates. On the other hand the Nielsen Gundersen domination hadn't really begun. The man likely to have succeeded that year was probably Billy Sanders