TheCookster

It is certainly true that you have less free rein as a tenant rather than as the landowner, but I would suggest that there are plenty of people who would contest whether Dave Tattum and all his team had done their best.

No major surprise to see the doors finally closing at Stoke - it has been in a state of (mis)managed decline for some years now. Tracks that are well promoted have been finding life tough, so one such as Stoke, where the "promoters" have left an awful lot to be desired was a closure waiting to happen.

Very fair point ... and that is exactly what I would have done, if that facility had been available / required at the time.

And you are still an ignoramus.

Thanks - but watching at home on the television now.

Of course they do - which is why disabled folk, more than most, will inform themselves, before they even commit to going to an event, that provisions such as parking will be available for them. I was informed back in December 2015 that parking would not be an issue and on that basis I booked my ticket. At no point since has anybody contacted me to inform me otherwise. As they have both my e-mail and home address details, this would not have been a difficult or costly exercise once they became aware that it would potentially be an issue.

The fact remains, learned friend, that even now the official SWC website still states that there is sufficient parking for disabled visitors at the venue. If a disabled person reads that (clearly you are not) then what reason would they have to expect that they would need to make a separate booking in order to guarantee availability. Perhaps the organisers should have mentioned something like this when they happily banked the £70 for the ticket.

What an ignoramus.

Whether or not that addresses the problem really depends on the nature of the disability. Not all wheelchair users are disabled and not all disabled people use wheelchairs. That is an overly simplistic take on the situation.

Some standards have been produced by the British Standards Institution (BSI), which recommend that commercial premises should have one space for every employee who is a disabled motorist plus 5% of the total capacity for visitor parking should be designated as disabled parking,

I rang them this morning to confirm availability of disabled spaces. I was informed that there were no remaining parking spaces and that the only option was to utilise the Park & Ride from the Etihad.

Well, what is fact is that the official SWC Facebook page states: VENUE INFO Disabled Access Sufficient parking available in accordance with the Green Guide ... and this is clearly not the case.

That may or may not have been the case and BV may or may not have provided more than the minimum they are legally required to provide. I would still maintain that if they are only working to minimum criteria then that is not offering optimum customer service. Surely a better approach would have been to dedicate more disabled spaces at the stadium by redirecting more able bodied visitors to the Park & Ride option. It isn't rocket science, just common sense.

In case anybody is not aware, there is apparently no more disabled parking available at the National Speedway Stadium. They are now expecting anybody who is entitled to disabled parking to use the Park & Ride too. Very poor in my opinion.

I thought it was the right team to pick back in mid-June and still think it is the best selection that could have been made. There is no doubt that Rosco would have been under pressure to make alternative choices - especially sentimental pressure for Harris to be included - but he has resisted that emotional pressure and made sound selections.

A nice, considered and well-rounded response.

And might that not simply be down to the fact that he has learned from his league outing at the track and has figured out a better way to ride the place as a result?

I would echo the view posted by several on here already and have the main team as: Woffinden King Cook Lambert If you are going to make use of home track advantage then, surely you go with a team of British riders who have proven themselves around the new Belle Vue track. The best indicator you have of that at the moment was last night's meeting. King, Cook and Lambert clearly performed better than anyone else. It would be madness not to select the current world champion, so Woffinden should be the other member of the team. I have no strong feelings as to who rides at reserve. If you had total flexibility to use the reserve for an underperforming rider then I could see sense in using Lambert in that role with someone else stepping into the main team, but as the reserve can only be used in the case of injury, then Lambert would be wasted there in that case. Ellis seems a reasonable shout.

Disappointing ... yes. Understandable ... certainly. It is a long time now since the British Championship carried any great kudos and it seems to me that Tai Woffinden is simply putting his priorities in order in a way that he believes will give him the best chance of success on the world stage. This stance isn't unique, for example, there have been a number of British World Boxing Champions over the years, but how many of them also competed for the title of British Champion once they had moved onto bigger things? Did they get slated as being unpatriotic when they didn't? Not that I recall.

The question you 'don't see' was the the very first part of my post: 'When were averages not used in speedway?' The question mark at the end of the sentence was the clue that it was a question.

I don't know. That's why I asked the question in the first place. (Edited for spelling)

When were averages not used in speedway? I've been watching since 1971 and averages were already being used then.

I think you would be hard pressed to find a track whose attendances had not dropped over the past few years. You would need to look at comparative figures for Rye and everyone else before you could suggest whether a lack of success was a significant factor. It could well be ... but then it could also be the case that Rye have been less badly affected - or at least no worse affected - than other tracks.

An unrealistic desire though, Screm. Most fixture alterations are necessitated as a result of weather conditions and there is no escaping the fact that speedway meetings are at a higher risk of postponement due to the weather than many other sports. I am sure that everyone involved in the sport (organisers, promoters, riders and spectators) would prefer a scenario where fixtures were 90%+ set in stone.

Thanks