norbold

i have 1937, 1938 and 1961.

The same as you, Steve, plus Young, Craven, Knutson, Holder, Woffy. Also seen Freddie Williams.....but not riding!

Indeed, macca. One of the great stories he told me once was, in his typical modest manner, about a race he lost! It was about the time Rayleigh, then challenging for the Provincial League title in 1961 took on Edinburgh at Meadowbank. The previous year, Rayleigh had inflicted Edinburgh's heaviest home defeat of the season and had gone on to win the League title. They were expected to do much the same this time, but after twelve heats the scores were level. So it was all on the last heat. Stan and Reg Reeves were out for Rayleigh up against George Hunter and Doug Templeton. As they came into the last bend on the last lap of the last race, Hunter led from Reeves and Stevens with Templeton trailing in last place. A draw looked inevitable. This is where Stan took up the story for me. "I thought I was holding Templeton, but as I rode in to the last bend on the fourth lap I could see the whole crowd in the main stand rise to their feet as one and that was when I realised that Doug had got me with an amazing manoeuvre as he cut through on the inside of me." That description has always stayed with me as such a graphic illustration of the way that match finished, giving a 4-2 and the match to Edinburgh at the last gasp.

Indeed. Stan was my hero. In spite of the Fundins, Cravens and Collins etc. of this world, I always say that he is my favourite rider of all time. A great team man. His pairing with Ken McKinlay at West Ham was one of the best team pairings in speedway in my opinion. And who can forget the night he beat Briggo at West Ham!? Heat five on the 15th of July 1969. West Ham v. Swindon. That race lives in the memory of all West Ham supporters still. It was Briggo's only defeat of the night and not only that but three weeks later Briggo won the British Final at West Ham with a maximum 15 points.... I got to know Stan very well in later life - he even came to my 60th birthday party! He is such a modest man as well. He says he knew he was never going to be one of the greats but he just enjoyed riding and always tried to do his best for whatever team he was riding for. And he certainly did that. A wholehearted never give up trier.

I had a similar experience with trying to find Cradley. Back in 1965, I was a West Ham supporter at college in Norwich. (Incidentally why I was at Norwich is another story I might explain later!) West Ham were on track to pull off the treble, League, Cup and London Cup. If we won the away match at Cradley the League was ours. So I hired a car and got a few college friends to come with me and I drove from Norwich to Cradley. So there I was following the signposts to Cradley when I came to a T junction with absolutely no signs at all, so I took a guess and finished up in Halesowen. Fortunately there was a Tourist Office in the main car park in the town, so I went there to ask directions to Cradley. It was closed. So we got back in the car and just drove around a bit hoping to stumble on the right road. We eventually got to Cradley just in time. I found some of my West Ham friends and a good evening was had by all as we beat Cradley and won the League. Naturally, I started celebrating with the West Ham supporters and decided to travel back to London with them on the coach. Fortunately one of my Norwich friends could drive, so he said he would take the car back to Norwich. They told me afterwards that they took the car and slept in a lay-by as they didn't fancy the drive back that late at night. Meanwhile, when we got back to West Ham in the early hours, I still had a long way to go to get back home as we had just moved to Loughton and decided I would walk back to Hackney with a friend of mine, a distance of some five miles. About half way back we decided we needed a rest and went into an all night launderette for a quick nap. We eventually got back to my friend's house at about 7:00 a.m., where we had another quick nap. I then got the bus and tube up to Loughton, looked in at home (much to my parents' surprise!) and got the train back to Norwich, where I met up with my travelling companions from the day before, who said they were never going to go to another speedway meeting in their life if it meant having to drive half way across the country!

Not quite, but you could just before the War: Monday - Wimbledon; Tuesday - West Ham; Wednesday - New Cross; Thursday - Wembley; Friday - Hackney; Saturday - Harringay. No Hackney just after the War, though Walthamstow ran for a short time, but on a Thursday, same as Wembley.

I think Maurie Mattingly was a milkman as was Nobby Stock. I don't think we'd better go into what Split Waterman did in his spare time.....

Back in the late 60s/early 70s I used to go to speedway three times a week most weeks. Hackney and West Ham regularly plus Wimbledon probably 2 or 3 times a month. And when Wembley re-opened usually got in one a month there as well. Do supporters go travelling round the country these days following their team or get in say 10-12 meetings every month?

Brothers? Jack and Cordy Milne and Jack and Norman Parker would take some beating. Then there's Tom and Sid Farndon, Vic and Ray Duggan, Roger and Buster Frogley, Peter and Brian Craven, Jeff and Wally Lloyd. Reg and Eddie Reeves.

Thank you, Tigerblade.

Not sure what you mean "unlike Moore". Ronnie Moore is generally reckoned to be the greatest team rider of all time, while Briggo has the complete opposite reputation! Edit: Just reread. Sorry, thst's what you're getting at isn't it!? Doh!

Good thinking Rob. I agree that Mauger/Moore would be a better pairing than Mauger/Briggs and could hold the key to the meeting. If Moore can gate in front of the Danish and Swedish pairings he would be very hard to pass allowing Mauger to shoot off and win. There should be some great speedway when those three pairs meet! Throw in Duggan/Young or Wilkinson/Duggan plus Farndon/Craven I'd even pay to go and watch!

It seems not about that period, but there is debate on other periods, particularly the more recent eras. Greg or Tai; Jason or Nicki.

Just sent off a speedway photo for them. I never got to see speedway at Walthamstow - before my time! However, I did get to know the outside of the stadium quite well as our school sports ground was nearby and in the winter we set off from there to go cross country running. The course took us round the outside of the stadium!

Yes, exactly, that was the point I was making. It wasn't mean to be a yearly comparison. Of course that would come out differently. It was to look at the era as a whole.

I started this thread to generate a bit of interest in some of the great names of the past and to get people's views on who they thought the greatest were. I didn't start it so that two people could just behave like kids in the playground and hurl ridiculously childish insults at each other. Start up your own thread if you want to do that and leave this one to the grown ups. Thank you.

Well before my time, BOBBATH!

That's the one, Alan. Thanks.

Just thinking about all this again, wasn't there one year when an angler actually got most votes as the result of a campaign by the Angling Times and the BBC said this was against the rules and discounted his votes?

I don't know. But 1st, 2nd and 3rd in 1972 were: Mary Peters, Gordon Banks and Richard Meade.

Barry Briggs is the only speedway rider to have been in the first three. Ivan Mauger never made it.

And driving through red lights. Don't forget that one.

That's the one. Thanks, Pugwash. And it just goes to show how unreliable personal memories can be as Nigel didn't take part in that discussion after all. It must have been a similar discussion on the Speedway History site. But it was interesting to see that a certain former speedway magazine editor used five different pseudonyms during the course of the debate so he could argue with himself. Dear oh dear.

Nigel used to be quite active on here under his "handle" which I can't remember at the moment. He took a very active part in particular along with Ross and me in arguing with BFD and the six or seven manifestations of a certain former speedway magazine editor over Johnnie Hoskins' claim to have invented speedway. He was also on Jim Blanchard's history of speedway website and came up with a lot of really interesting information. He used to spend many hours in the Newspaper Library digging out obscure information. He may still do for all I know!

Actually it hadn't really occurred to me before that the only British rider I had in my list was Tom Farndon.