The Dog

Was a superb Brummies performance with an excellent track and a large crowd. Kids races at the interval with lots of youngsters and happy faces. All done by 9.30pm with a 2nd half afterwards. Absolutely nothing to criticise about tonight and I'm glad because everyone concerned with Birmingham deserved a night like this.

I know I know, was just hoping it wasn't all down to the Speedway side of things...

It's an idea similar to the Super League that Matt Ford spoke about years ago which was met with a lot of negativity, but yes, why not give it a go? What has British speedway got to lose?

Have just read the last dozen or so posts on here and they all pretty much hit the nail on the head. I think the riders in the GP saw themselves as a big attraction to their club and so did the promotion, so in their eyes it was a probably a win win situation for both, although ultimately its become a big loss for the British leagues and the fans

Sounded a really entertaining meeting with Plymouth showing great character to come from so far back to win it at the death. I'm sure the return leg at Perry Barr now has an extra edge because Birmingham will be seething at throwing the win away. Should be an excellent contest tonight!

Maybe it's Spedeworth that's in trouble...

Maybe so, but as they all develop at different rates you can never tell for sure. Jason Doyle is a good example of this. All I was pointing out is that now we have Woffy, Lambert and Bewley doing well on the world scene, it buys us a bit of time to find the next Woffy.

If you look at it another way Pinny, Bewley and Lambert have made great strides in just a few years and barring major injuries, should stay at a top level for GB for maybe the next 10-15 years, which is plenty of time to develop /unearth the next 'superstar'...

Christ, what a mess. Makes you wonder why a club waits until its 50k in debt (apparently) and can't pay riders before coming to the conclusion that it's in trouble...

Given the current home form and the fact that they seem to have solved the dust issues (dust free last week), lovely weather forecast too, this should be another really good contest and probably the last chance to see 3x World Champion Jason Crump up close at Perry Barr. Be great to see him in person in the pits and get his autograph and a photo. Throw in another GP winner in Bjarne Pedersen and exciting youngsters in Ruml and Keleher and its a good meeting in prospect. I'd certainly be favouring a trip to Birmingham than watching West Brom reserves any day of the week....

A post echoed by all speedway fans Sidney

I think where cricket wins slightly is that the wicket areas are all the same size and can be covered quickly by a roof on wheels. Speedway doesn't have that luxury unfortunately. I'm not sure how cricket has actually re-invented yourself other than team colours and names and numbers but then again I'm not a huge cricket fan.

I think now that Bewley is establishing himself in Poland, he will be the next one to follow Woffy and Lambert. But I should have added Lambert to the list

Surely the only way speedway can move forward now is to make our own fixtures priority, like the British Final. If the likes of Woffy, Bewley etc would rather miss out on the chance to be National Champion for another payday in Poland, so be it. Let's look after the riders and fans who are prepared to be a part of it

As a kid I'd always look forward to a damp meeting because it always threw up some fascinating racing and unexpected results and that was all pre airfence days when they had a reason to moan about conditions being dangerous...

They could still record it and play it on the Monday night but let the fans and riders have their day back. A Sunday afternoon might be better for a bigger crowd and youngsters.

Given that nearly all the 'top riders' in this country don't ride in the Polish league, is it time to make the British Final the biggest meeting of the year and give it a Sunday afternoon date again?

Maybe they can borrow 'Mystic Meg' the weather expert from Eastbourne. Great at spotting clouds, not so great at spotting financial ineptitude....

Didn't the gps in Australia lose an awful lot of money tho and take into account the planning and organising to get riders and equipment there it's probably a bit of a ballache for everyone. Don't get me wrong, I think it should be spread around and venture to new countries but just right now Poland seems to run the show and the riders seem happy to go with it

Fastest time around Birmingham since 2014 apparently, so credit to the track curator for getting it in excellent condition!

Birminghams prices are certainly competitive as I'm sure they let 16-22yr olds in for a fiver, which is student aged, I think 12-16 is £2 and under 11s go in free. The centre green kids entertainment is something that the promotion have been doing for at least the last 4 or 5 years, only stopped by covid recently, same with the pits visits and track walk, so Birmingham have been doing good things.

Given the way that Poland seems to be the Mecca of speedway nowadays, I can see most of the gps being held there with maybe the odd venture into Sweden or Denmark. Easier for riders to get about too, so sadly we might just have seen the last of Cardiff. I was told that all the shale they use for Cardiff has been sold/dissappeared too so who knows...

I think its hard for an away team to come up against Riss and Harris in 2 of the last 3 heats tbh and get a result unless your already well ahead by then tbh

The whole financial structure needs sorting out, nobody seems to know what riders wages are tho my guess is that collectively they outstrip turnstile clicks. Until recently, there has never seemed to be too many of them working during the winter so they must be earning quite well to compensate this. We all want the best riders and successful teams but not at the cost of clubs going under, hopefully riders realise this too because it's their jobs that are disappearing...

Online promotion only makes regular speedway fans aware that there's a meeting coming up and they already know that. It's trying to seduce the newbies into speedway that's the hard bit.