pandorum

Just move the Mickey Mouse meeting...simples.....they can have the ELRC anytime A few here have insinuated it though. Surely if a former English world champion who captained the England side and has given a ton to the sport including his help in establishing Redcar as a PL team can't have a meeting to say goodbye to one of the countries brightest talents after a cruel injury ended his career then what exactly is the point of this stupid sport? Maybe he is skint but the guy deserves every penny and every accolade he gets. Same with Mark Loram, PC or Wuffy. If they need a bit of help sometime I would hope the sport would stand up and be counted for them. Of course the same applies to any injured rider but Havvy is something special even among that special breed known as the speedway rider. He gave plenty to the sport so don't begrudge him this. Hell didn't one of the Aussies have a 'Farewell' tour of Britain and a meeting and then came back and rode again and I don't recall anyone getting on his back? I won't be there but wish him a full house and a great night. A great servant to speedway surely whether you like him or not?

Havvy deserved better that this Some Mickey Mouse meeting that could be held anytime spoils his long planned big day. Bloody shameful

It's excellent news and I got to be honest I never thought it would happen. Glad it has though but speedway has to make use of this opportunity now and showcase the sport. No more Belle Vue farces and teams who come to a fixture with less hope than Bob of getting past 30. Show competetive matches on tracks prepared for racing as far as the weather permits of course. Give the viewer a reason to watch Monday night speedway. Hopefully they will at last get a sponsor for the league who can help with that and also the young kids get a chance to show what they are worth and they take that chance. It's probably the sports last chance to really shine. Hope it takes it And also glad to see Kel and Nig will be commentating

Typical response from the 'Star'. So you advocate this ridiculous and childish treatment of a small but significant section of SKY viewers? There is no reason for ir. Nobody is asking SKY for the names and addresses of the riders or demanding to know who will prepare the track for the first meeting. All thier customers are asking is will the sport be covered this season. A 'respected' speedway promoter has already confirmed that it is but because this promoter jumped the gun SKY behaves like a petulant child and delays the announcement. Treating customers this way is pathetic and the support the 'Star' gives such an attitude speaks volumes for that erstwhile 'voice of the sport'. There is no need for it. If that's your attitude Phil I am glad I was a Mail reader

I just looked and although I did not have my glasses on it looks like Hammers v Eastbourne and Belle Vue v Leicester

You mean like the Integrity of last years SWC, Polish Play Offs or the Brit EL final? The words Integrity and Speedway are distant cousins mate. It's a Speedway Meeting that could be televised and make a few quid for the sport and even get a few viewers interested. Hope they work it out and go for it. Who gives a rats arce if it has Integrity.

Short answer NO! Long answer NOO! Scott Autrey was far better than him as far as I am concerned and his best was 3rd. There were loads of Yanks who gave it a go at the top level and did not make the World Final so why was he better than them? Not a shred of evidence to back up his case. Just because he was a master of tiny tracks and the final was never at Eastbourne is not a case in his favour. As it said at the beginning he was not interested enough to try but that is not a case that he would have won if he had made the effort. Not a chance in Hell!

Hilarious Matt. I bet you are popular in a pub around closing time But then your comment is just total bollocks as I have watched Moto GP lots of times and did not get one

As you are addressing it this to me Henry I will respond to it. What exactly is the logic in allowing riders to retain some random number for the GP series. The old system you deride made 'perfect sense' as it identified the riders in some kind of order from year to year. If anyone watching a SGP meeting was CONFUSED by the numbers 1 to 16 as a way of identifying the field then may I suggest that that person was what is commonly referred to as an 'idiot'. But now we will see random numbers between 1 and infinity appear during these meetings therefore complicating something that was inherently simple before. Your point about the merchandising is bogus as these random numbers can be used for merchandising purposes anyway as a Greg Hancock T Shirt or commemorative ashtray can easily use the riders favourite number and anyone buying this will know what the number refers to surely. The merchandising would hardly promote SGP Greg at #3 one year and #5 the next as the only # worth promoting from the point of view of the SGP 1-16 numbering system would surely be #1 in the world. So the idea that somehow these 1-16 numbers prevent a rider from taking advantage of merchandising opportunities is frankly ludicrous. Riders would be free to promote themselves on the merchandising front regardless of which number they gain from thier SGP sojourn as that number would not need to come into the merchandising. As surely who cares if you are #7 in the world? I presume riders sell T Shirts of themselves and seriously doubt they use the number they are allocated in a GP. This random numbering system is nothing more than a vanity project for the likes of Hancock and should have been crushed mercilessly underfoot at birth. Hancock will wear #45. Now I have no idea why Hancock is wearing #45 and also not the slightest interest so seeing him with #45 on his back in an SGP will seem stupid to me and I bet the majority of those watching on TV or in the stadium. There is no logic in using this system for SGP or SEC at all and certainly not the slightest bit of advantage to the audience for the SGP. What happens if rider X with #81 (year of his birth) is eliminated and rider Y who also craves #81 (as it is the year his favourite album was released) qualifies via the challenge. There is nothing to stop him being #81 as rider X is no longer there. Imagine what confusion it will create when fans of rider X turn up to see X but find Y riding instead. No point to it, no logic to it and certainly no sense to it. And people whine about the Joker in SWC making the sport look Mickey Mouse ### The recent US Monster challenge meeting showed the pitfalls of such a system when in the junior class we had a race featuring TWO #1s. I wonder how many watching were confused by this and how many WOULD have been confused by a simple sequential numbering syatem. So Tai next year with #1 on his back would not indicate he was #1 last year? Of course this only applied to the 1-8 so your point has a touch of validity when it comes to picks etc. But what will the number #105 or #273 indicate to the majority of viewers that don't know that 273 was the bus a rider took to school everyday when he was a kid?

Well it surely does not take much brain matter to figure out which one. But on a serious note where exactly is this lot of sense in letting riders choose thier own number.? Obviously the highly confusing numbering system the GP currently uses needs looking at. I mean the utterly insane method of numbering riders in sequencial order from 1 to however number of riders are in a meeting based on some kind of merit system must cause tremendous confusion. It must be Hell for people to try and figure out who the four blokes in a race are over the minute of the race with confusing numbers between 1 and 16 so obviously allowing riders to choose any number that takes thier fancy will resolve that situation and make it far easier to recognise riders in races. It looks like the lunatics really have taken over the SGP asylum.

He would probably be better of with 616 as that is the actual number of the beast and 666 simply an error in translation that is still used by Iron Maiden. A Moscow bus route was changed from 666 as the passengers were nervous travelling on such a bus. The new number was 616. You could not make this up Can't understand the sense in this to allow riders thier favourite numbers. What next let them choose the colour of thier helmet cover like jockeys?

Good point TWK. After all sponsors hoping for TV exposure and supporters wanting to know whether to include SKY in thier 2014 budget are as nothing compared to the BSPA and thier exciting lives. How stupid it seems that all this has been caused because some big mouthed idiot sought to make himself sound more important than he really is to a local paper with a circulation less than Philips SS. And now it seems SKY have taken the hump and will not release a statement saying whether or not the sport will be on TV in 10 weeks or whatever it is. They would rather hang on until the weekend before and cause huge amount of disruption to riders wanting to secure sponsors and advertise them on thier equipment and viewers who have no idea whether they want to continue with thier expensive SKY package or indeed purchase a new one. What a bunch of pathetic f###### idiots the lot of them.

Crayford, Canterbury, Castleford, Halifax, Middlesbrough, Wimbledon, Weymouth, Ellesmere Port

I use it to find out how badly I am riding and wether my moaning and whining has gotten me another SGP gig as it did this year. I would be lost without it. Chris xx

I'm actually Chris Harris

no

Yes indeed but you do have the option to keep it if you are inclined

Yes but Durex did not seek to empty your bank account and were more like a safety deposit box!

Because one are corrupt scumbags who prey upon the poor and the other one is a pawn shop I think Wonga sponsor several football teams and football will sell itself to anybody it's that greedy but I doubt speedway will get more than a middling championship players salary out of it really. I was being facetious with my remark but it's still embarrassing being sponsored by a pawn shop surely

Hopefully you just plucked those names out of the air as surely speedway is looking a bit higher than a corrupt bunch of money lenders and a pawn shop

It's lucky he never had it sent it by TNT as he would have to have adhered to thier door knocking policy and would probably be lucky if he had it by Easter. You have to read the thread to know what I am waffling on about Seriously though that was a fantastic thing to do by Chris who showed the best side of this sport. I doubt Alex Ferguson would have done that for a Utd fan. And yes OK Utd are bigger and richer etc but it was still a truly nice thing to do by someone in Chis position. A great rider in the day and obviously a really nice bloke.

If someone of the stature of PC says these things then only an idiot would disregard what he says. That is indeed a fair point.

16 Things we learned from the Monster Energy Invitational meeting. 1 Transgenders are not wanted as Monster Energy Girls. (I was sure one of them was exactly that during this years SGP) 2 If you are bored you can leave now and someone else will take your spot. (something we dare not ever say here in the UK) 3 Annie Perot can play the American National anthem on the violin. 4 Plywood is a southern California thing. 5 Eddie Kennett seems like a really nice guy! (hope they checked his silencer) 6. Briggo can go over to the adult beverage department 7. US announcers don't feel the need to apologise to the world when someone says fart or crap 8 Red is not halfway 9 If you have not enjoyed the evening the announcer apologises for that 10 Tonights collection for the 50/50 draw is 2156 dollars 11 Jimi Hendrix was still touring the last time Sonny Nutter won the California State Championship 12 Sonny Nutter had the best tush in speedway 13 The shirts were from Bubba 14 The announcer doesn't care how many points they brought into it. 15 If you are confused by this then God you really have problems with calculus 16 honestly if you are bored please leave now as the rest of us don't want to have a traffic problem It was a bit of fun of a meeting with a bit of good racing and very welcome over the winter break. The commentator was a bit mad to say the least and should be brought to the UK to translate for Sam Ermolenko. Hopefully we will see a bit more Yank racing over the next few weeks online. Nice to see how they give opportunity to kids at meetings like this The announcer /commentator was frankly brilliant and made the meeting entertaining. He would be great on SKY and liven up the dull fare we get in the UK.

Compared to some of you lot that was mild in the extreme. You never heard of the old adage people who live in glass houses etc. The forum is full of hypocrites (not particularly getting at you so don't have an attack of indignation ) who cry foul when it suits them but induldge in some of the worst excursions into the sewer on the whole forum. One of the worst actually liked your post which gave me a good laugh