E I Addio

I think the racing has been generally pretty good this year but you can only beat what's in front of you. I often say Wolves are usually good visitors and so it proved last night. The thing about this Wolves team is that they can all gate and that gives the home side something to race against, compared with Coventry a few weeks ago who were mostly pretty slow off the gate so a lot of races were over by bend two, then you get the sour grapes brigade blaming the track. I know Peter Adams gets a bit of stick from some fans but I think it's very rare for Wolves to come to Lakeside at not put up a fight, whoever is in the side and I can only put that down to Peter Adams. Just a thought. It's just a bit of a disappointment that Lindgren is not as dominant as he used to be otherwise this one could have gone down to the wire.

The crowd was admittedly smaller than normal but it's nit surprising. All those sitting at home have no idea how cold it was . It was F-E-R-EEEEEEE-Z-I-N-G early on and a doubt whether any reduced admission woukd have made much difference. it's a pity because a warm evening with the kids on half term usually brings in a much bigger crowd than that. Having said that, if they were all crammed in to a small area as at Wolves it would seem pretty big. Despite the s mall crowd I thought it was a great atmosphere, especially up to about heat 10 or 11 when the result was a certainty. Haven't seen Kylmos interview but some of the fastest times of the season were being recorded early on so it couldn't have been that bad. Didn't seem to affect AJ , Ed or Lewis. Max Clegg - what an improvement since he last came. I was well impressed. What's happened to Freddie , going round at the back hugging the white line like that? Not the rider of a few years ago. Well done Wolves, I nearly always enjoy their visits. A cold night but very enjoy able from a Lakeside perspective. Glad I went.

No doubt you'll make good use of the "off" button then, and you won't have a dull evening watching the same dull teams on a dull track and we don't have to put up with your dull comments thereon. Win-win all round.

Put me on ignore if you wish . Your posts stand to be judged by all forum members whether they are mature or as Bryn said, bitter and twisted but it's worth reflecting on what dome fans have said already :- Other than that I have nothing more to add except you may wish to try the decaf.

Lewis Bridger is under a six point average in the EL and needs more rides. A move to Ipswich woukd suit him and the club, but at the moment it seems the BSPA are blocking any move to a PL club even though they agreed to Craig Cook doubling down even though he is average in the EL is two points higher than Bridgers. Total inconsistency by the BSPA. Kerr has scored consecutive paid maximums in his last two home meetings for Lakeside. He obviously has the ability but for some reason Ipswich are not bringing it out.

Agreed. It's far more offensive IMO when people come on here telling us riders are "not trying " can't be bothered " " not interested" etc, etc, when in fact they don't know why a rider is performing badly, whether it be a bike problem, recurrence of an old injury or some other reason.

With regard to Bjarne, the primary concern in team building for 2016 was to do away with the number of guests that had to be used in 2015, which resulted in massive complaints from the fans. That was why Lakeside had what is, in effect a squad system. Once Bjarne said in one breath that his commitment was to British Speedway then almost in the next breath th at his Polish commitments woukd come first, there was no way he coukd be signed without the promotion going back on their commitment to make every effort to avoid guests. With regard to Swiderski, I he is tremendously popular with the home fans and has done a great job as a second string at home but the reality is he is not the heatleader material he was before the serious leg injury he sustained a few years ago. Personally I hate to see him dropped but the promotion have an obligation to the fans to,put out the strongest side they can and is reasonable that Kennett should to be given a chance to prove himself. He is, these days, a better gater and a better overtaker than Swid, although Swiderski could still be back. But whether I agree with dropping Swiderski is not the point. Lakeside , like any other promotion have to take decisions that some fans don't agree with. You can't please all the people all the time. The difference is that most fans are able to articulate their displeasure without the degree of vituperence that you used earlier on this thread, and others, and indeed on the Lakeside forum before it was closed down. Jon Cook is not perfect, but he is not the devil personified. With regard to Kelvin, you have mentioned yourself the constency of Rich Lawson and the improvement of Kim Nilsson at home this year. Jon Cook mentioned on Friday that these are two of the riders Kelvin has been working with this year, so there is your answer. Look at Lewis Kerr , he is performing better for Lakeside than he is for Ipswich- that's Kelvin again. After all the personal abuse you heaped on Neil Vatcher I would have thought you would see Kelvin as a step forward.

If you don't like liars perhaps you can give us link to anything that will support your claim that Bjarne was ever signed, because as far as I am aware he never was actually signed. You chose to ignore the fact that Bjarne said in a Speedwáy Star interview that he was going to give 100% commitment to Britsh Speedwáy then when he got a job in Poland he suddenly decided that was his priority and was going to miss several crucial Lakeside fixtures. As to the dropping of Swiderski, if you had bothered to attend the fans forum, which you disparagingly refer to as "happy clappers", you would have heard Jon Cook say that once Edward Kennetts early season fixture clashes for Rye House were out of the way it would be decided on form. If you bothered to read Jon Cooks comments on the website before hurling abuse at him, you woukd know that Swiderski had a TV meeting in Poland on Friday so it was an ideal opportunity to give Kennett an outing. Again if you bothered to keep up with information released by the club you would know the present arrangement is only for four meetings and will then be reviewed . All the riders were aware of this when they signed for the club. As Liam said , Jon Cook is not everybody's cup of tea, and he seems to have made a misjudgment on the signing of Rob Mear as things stand at the moment, but you seem to be the only one who sees fit to abuse him because of it. Bottom line is that like him or loathe him, Cook has managed to keep the club running with the books more or less balancing at without the huge losses that have driven other clubs out of the Elite League. In fact it's largely due to him that there is still a club at all. Constructive criticism is justified , abuse isn't, and certainly calling fellow fans "happy clappers " who believe anything Cook tells them simply because they attend a fans forum which you didn't, is the height childish behaviour, and referring to Kelvin as "Tantrum" is sheer ignorance.

Certainly everyone is entitled to an opinion, but it's a pity you seem unable to express yours in a civil and balanced manner.

No. But read stevebrums post #52 and see if the cap fits

He is not boring at all. Completely bonkers perhaps, neurotic at times, a total geek when it comes to figures,goes off at all kinds of tangents, has a bizarre point of view on nearly everything, but boring -NO. Like most nutters his posts are eminently readable. Give me SCB any day against the persistent whingers like Moxey63, Robert 72 , etc, the dullards like Starman, or any of the armchair track curators. Nutters are part of life's rich pageant. Moaners are boring. I'd still prefer Eric Chitty though.

Hollow victory for Lakeside. They were lucky Paul Starke pulled out and would probably not have won with him there. Something wrong if they can't turn a weakened team like that over. Poor performance from Bridger, not much better from Kennett considering they were both riding as second strings. Good effort from the Lions pulling all the stops out , with a weakened team. Good performance by Klindt but it does once again highlight the ridiculous situation that is going on with reserve berths at the moment.

This a great thread. Where did you buy your first real six-string Sid ? I bought mine at the five-and-dime . Played it till my fingers bled. It was the summer of 69. Shame the scale only goes up to 10. If it went up to 35 I'd nominate Eric Chitty.

An excellent post that says all that really needs to be said on the subject. All we have from Chapman so far is playing to the gallery, talking about tearing the rule book up and starting again. Around 80/85% of the Speedway Regulations are governed by FIM rules, Health and Safety, Insurance, and a whole range of other matters that would still have to come out the same if you tore them up and re-wrote them. There are a few sections of the team building regulations and racing rules that are controversial (usually because it suits people to claim they don't understand them in order to cheat) and those are the ones that need looking at. I am afraid the jury is still out on Mr Chapman and until he comes out and says "This is what I think is wrong, this is how it needs to be put right " . theres not really much to judge him on. Talking about ripping the entire thing up when most of it is ok is just pandering to the great unwashed . What really matters is what he wants it to look like when its done. So me it was a bit of a non-article.

Lakeside went down by about 70-20 or something at Poole a few years ago. Happens to most clubs sooner or later, but things come in cycles. Feel sorry for you guys but Lakeside also had a pretty grim year last year, losing half the home matches. It just the way things go sometimes.

Good to see Dave Watt getting god reception from the Lakeside fans on riders parade. Proves he still has a lot of support at Lakeside despite a small number of BSF critics. He rode pretty well as well, not quite his usual self but getting back on track. Still looks very stylish round Lakeside. Good for him. Lewi Kerr collected his second successive paid maximum . He has now improved to the point of looking a totally different rider to the one that joined the club last March. AJ was something else tonight. Absolutely phenomenal .

I bet the Belle Vue team will need a cold shower to calm them down after all that excitement.

I guess we are pretty much on all fours there. I agree heck of a lot of passing is pushing it and it was the least interesting meeting at Lakeside this year. Coventry are a puzzle. They are not a particularly bad team on paper, they just seem to underperform inexplicably on track .

King was passed by Swiderski then re-passed him, King was passed by AJ, Sarj was passed by Mear (which probably led to him falling off.), Kerr passed a couple on his way to a paid max and they are some I remember but as you say, the Bees were diabolical from the gate and generally at the back by bend one,. You can hardly blame the track for that because King was probably the best gater overall on either side so he was managing . Bomber is an enigma. I thought at one stage we were going to see some vintage Bomber but after the first couple of rides he really seemed out of sorts. I don't know whats the matter with Coventry. When you get any teams top two, both GP riders, only scoring 13 points between them it is usually symptomatic of some problem within the team itself. It looked to me like it was just seven riders, not a team. Nobody was looking out for their partners and were constantly getting carved up by the Hammers on bends 1&2 because of it because of it. It really seemed to me that nobody had put their heads together and worked out any sort of arrangement on what they were going to do. According to SS Bomber has all kinds of gripes going on and maybe that is affecting the whole team. After all he is the senior rider. I like Bomber and I quite like KK but at best I don't think they have ever really been genuine team players.. Whatever it is they don't give the impression of being a happy ship just now.

I actually quite enjoyed it, although we all do when we win . A bit boring early on, but the weather improved, the track improved and the racing improved. The usual sour grapes brigade are having their moan because their team doesn't have a divine right to win everything but what I liked was that, in my view everyone on both sides chipped in with some effort and I wouldn't say any rider on either side wasn't trying . All seemed to have a go even if some were only on a two lap dash but it was ok.. My impressions : AJ - A captains innings. I think he only made the gate twice but was immaculate all night Swid - Competent job Rich- Low score through being caught in traffic and wrong place at the wrong time but deserved a better points return Lewis B. - Finding his feet having been dropped to second string. I thought it was a gamble putting him in Heat 15 but suddenly the old Lewis from 2014 appeared and last off the gate he swept through on the inside of bend two and never looked back. Great ride in which he left KK and King in the distance. He was ecstatic and the crowd were behind him (well the Lakeside fans anyway) Hopefully there will be more of this to come Kim- Slowly blossoming into a decent heatleader but still work in progress. His pass on Bomber was a good one that shows his progress Super Meario = An interview with in the programme it seems he is still having trouble sorting his engines but it was his best meeting to date, and I think his first race win of the season. Good night for him. Lewis K.- Jon Cook said on the mic they had a long chat with Lewis and explained that he shouldn't put himself under pressure to score points, just go out and enjoy it, which he did --with a paid maximum KK - Impressive when he made that gate but not really with it when he didn't. I think the only rider he actually passed all night was Danny King Danny- I like Danny. Usually scores fairly well a Lakeside. A ruthless move from AJ in heat 7 had him shaking his head in disbelief but he was ready next time out and held AJ off despite tremendous pressure to take the win. Great ride. Leigh Lanham - On a moped for his first two rides then suddenly woke up and caused a few ripples. It didn't help his scoreline much but it gave Swidders a bit of a shock for a couple of laps. Bomber. - I do like watching Bomber. Looked like he was going to be a thorn in the Lakeside side in his first couple of rides then inexplicably lost his way and looked fairly ordinary. Kac- About what you would expect for a first timer at the track but what I will say for him is that he improved 100% in the course of the evening. Not enough to score points but enough to keep up for a couple of laps. I think the guy has a future and hope we haven't seen the last of him in GB Sarj- Again, didn't trouble the scorers much, but got his head down and had a go. I liked his spirit.

Except by Matt Ford

To be fair to Lewis he isn't really getting enough time in the bike, it seems, doing EL only and one meeting a fortnight for the last few weeks. He tweeted recently asking how Craig Cook can get PL place while he (Bridger) who has been out of the sport for 18 months is not allowed to ride PL . I know it's the rules but when you look at the comparable abilities of the two riders you have to ask what befuddled thinking went through the minds of the BSPA when they dreamed up such inconsistent rules.

Given the usual rate of progress at Coventry, I suppose that means we should get to about Heat 3 before it rains !

So instead of riders gardening we hold up the start while someone sweeps up the concrete grid ? Have you ever tried sweeping wet shale from a hard surface ? No different to trying to sweep mud, it just smears and the only way you can completely move it is to hose it down. Totally impractical to do that every race.

I think so too ! That really underlines the point. People forget that before they changed the rules about touching the tapes riders, especially Mauger would be rolling backwards and forwards trying to anticipate the the the start, because then, as now, a half decent rider who gets a flyer has a better than evens chance of winning the race, hence there were just as many ftg wins in the past as there are are today.