oldace

I am not aware of too many "Athletic Stadiums" being constructed in the past 10 years or so (Olympics excepted) Maybe plenty of land is used for Athletics but that is rather more aimed at participation than spectating. Even as a school field (and the school next door were given to believe it would be used as such) it would get much more use.

It isn't just the money though. Can the council justify giving over a piece of land to a speedway stadium that will attract 800 to 1200 people on approx 18 nights a year. Even as a speedway fan who would love it to happen In my heart of hearts this whole project seems far fetched

What on earth are you wittering about. If people express concern that this project seems unlikely then that means they dont want it to happen ? What an idiotic comment I would wager that not 1, not 1 single person on this forum wants this to fail and to a man would be delighted if it ever comes off.

To be honest the way THF leisure ran the zoological gardens was the business model most speedway promoters would later follow. They spent zero on the grounds allowing them to deteriorate year on year believing the public would still come in their droves, paying the same, or more, for more and more substandard facilities. By the late 70s the grounds were an ancient relic of a bygone era, the crowds all gone never to return. Sound familiar!!!!!

Are you sure about that? I thought MCC were funding the stadium with the club paying it back over 60 years. Whatever the funding though with the perilous state of the sport in this country the council are likely going to be left with a £6,000.000 white elephant long long before the money is repaid.

They don't need planning to knock it down though, Once it is just a brownfield site planning will be less of an issue

Now to be fair they have only been pushing planning permission for a year or so, the previous 12 months they were dotting the I s and crossing the T s

Hope you are not including me in that

I dont think it was ever a scam but feasible?. Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to be wrong but I have thought, and said so, that right from the off this was never going to happen.

The USA were also seeded for the two Long Beach Finals. They also had 2 guaranteed places in the 1982 Individual Final. Without the guarantee of home participation they would never have hosted any of those events. The WTCs of 76/79 and 82 prove that even in (what was at the time) speedway hotbeds fans wont turn out to watch these events if the hosts are not involved

Spot on Phil. In reality the GP was 10 years late. Successful business' dont wait for the cracks to turn into vast chasms. Constant evolution is essential but speedway was content to sit on a business model 20 years out of date and failing fast

If you avoid posting crap like the above, and liking other posts which are just as stupid then you wont get sarcastic responses. A speedway bike on a display on TV FFS

It doesn't even have planning permission to be built. Looks like the Aces are at the dog track in 2014 now

It is the representative team of the ACU and the ACU have no jurisdiction in Northern Ireland so no Paddy's in team GB yet!!!!

It was Ronnie Russell, not Len Silver

I presume his name and legacy was used as means of generating season ticket sales. i.e promise a meeting with little intention of actually running it Will the loss of the fixture now make a season ticket more expensive than gate admission?

Is there a right and wrong? I agree with you really, probably long before your time but it always seemed odd in the Eng v USA test matches of the early 80s the amount of Brits supporting the yanks. It was then, and probably still is, simply club rider support being transferred to his national team

Unless things have changed a rider in the World Cup will represent the country who issue his passport, in Sullivans case this would have been Australia. In individual world championship events, i.e the GP, a rider wears the colours of the country who issue his race license. Merely by riding on a license of the PZM for example wouldn't make a rider eligible to ride for Poland in the WTC, but because his affiliation to the FIM is through the Polish Federation he would wear the Polish flag on his body colour in the GP

It is done in order that the World Cup can be moved around a bit from the usual Denmark/Poland and occasionally Sweden/UK cycle. No other country in their right mind would take the event without the security of knowing they were in it to draw a crowd. Even in the sports glory days the terraces at White City in 76/79/82 were empty thanks to the absence of the hosts. Ironic as England were quite successful during that period and the only times we failed to qualify was when we were hosting the event

2012 was the first year that the hosts were seeded In 2011 Poland qualified for the Gorzow Final by winning at Kings Lynn In 2010 The Danes qualified for the Vojens final via the race off after being second in the Gorzow round In 2009 The Ploes qualified for the Leszno Final by winning at Peterborough I could go back further but still no team was seeded to the final

OK then, what about when you go to the newsagent for your Daily Mail. They hadn't sold many of yesterdays so it was on sale today with an insert for the TV page. You would be OK with that I take it. All promoters are doing is ensuring less and less fans buy programmes. In business it is so easy to rip people off, you can con anyone and everyone but only once they rarely come back a second time

And why no track at Cape Canaveral

Short stroke motors and super lightweight flywheels dont help though, it may get to peak revs pretty darn quick but will die a death as it hits any resistance, i.e dirt. For a rider only a few feet from a fence and going the wrong direction this is a mega problem, by the time the bikes got back enough revs to slide the back wheel and make a turn the rider is already under the fence

Have a look at September 06th 1976. All the back pages were almost given over entirely to speedway on that day

In reality though it pretty much always has been. It was popular late 20s early thirties because it was new but pretty soon was in decline, the invention of team racing carried it through to the war. Of course post war with a population starved of entertainment in had a boom 1946 to the early/mid 50s but by then (not helped by the entertainment tax) it was in decline up to the formation of the British League in 1965. This was the longest level of success the sport has known but by the early eighties the decline had started again and carried on right through to today. In an 85 year existence the sport was only really popular for less than 25 of those years, and in truth that was more luck than judgement.