f-s-p

I spoke with Seppänen today, said that the fixtures were released without Finland mentioned. As they were, since I checked Svemo's site also. Also there was a plan to ride the home meeting in Finland and unless Svemo or other clubs have ruled it out the plan is still there. Three tracks in Sweden hosting practise this weekend. Funasdälen, Arjeplog and Somenågonellerhurvik.

I wonder what's happened with the Finnish team in Allsvenskan? I saw Seppänen today but he did not say a word about this. Also they seem to have put an Allsvenskan meeting on both days while the Nordic final is at Forssa...

The training camp at Ylitornio has been cancelled all together due to no ice.

I watched the link you posted, looked like winter. Also a week a go there was a news clip from Jakutia region of Russia, neighbouring Amur possibly and there was full winter with -28. A woman interviewed said it was nothing, last winter they had -60...

They've had to re-schedule the Finnish training camp again due to poor (no) ice cnditions. It's now taking place 16th to 18th of December. And I think it goes on now during the same weekend as there is a camp in Sweden. The first cancellation took out the Poles from the lineup, we'll se what the Czech riders do with this one. Maybe the Poles will now get their ferries sorted? But still, it's a Finnish camp and mandatory for anyone wanting to represent Finland this season on international meetings. And the problem I understand remains in Europe, there's no ice to practise on...

Lemon the new Aussie manager? Whats the story?

I see they've scrapped the European Cup... Can someone please tell me, why was Vladivostoks score disqualided in last season EC?

The Finnish final has been set on March 3rd at Seinäjoki. Finland is again set to take part in the Swedish Allsvenskan, but the dates for the series are not known.

The Lahti one is on TMW's website, incidentally updated there in October. I found the Tampere meeting from my records yesterday, I'll post the results in due time.

Well it didn't go quite like that. That Rodney fellow is a bit lost though, I could have sworn he is Chris Harris!

It took a couple of reads, but I guess you're spot on. After having whined about them (and how they were followed) for a few years I thought why not do them myself. 3rd times the charm, or however it goes... Next year should go without any major hassle.

Four riders per team must fit under 30 points. They take their places in the team according to their averages #1 being the highest and so on... Sand Blowers actually won the league last season in a thrilling last heat decider. Their combined average was around 29,60. Foreigners (and Joonas Kylmäkorpi) will come on an assessed 10, alltough foreign U17 riders are 7,00. U17 riders are given their own figure, since there's again around 20 Swedish youngsters stepping up from 80cc. 10,00 would not give them even a chance to ride here. Averages are re calculated midway through for team building purposes. If your teams listed 1-4 when entered the season is over the limit, good on you and you are free to continue.

I have one that says 1992 on the cover... And I also have detailed results from a test match held at Tampere on May 4th 1975 between Finland and Soviet Union...

In the Finnish league we have...

We moved the AGM in Finland by a month after we had heard the FIM CCP had it's first calendar meeting in early October or what ever. Also I was told that the UEM would finalize their calendar on the first weekend of November... Hasn't quite worked out as planned... Got to just wait...

Any idea anyone when the international calendars will REALLY be published? I know the FIM calendar has been out via a Czech source for a couple of weeks now, but nothing official has been given.

The Finnish AGM was held a week ago here at Tampere. On top of the agenda were a few rule changes for the SM-liiga, how to open the Kaupunki Cup for possibly all riders and fine tuning a couple of other rules. Last season was the first year I've been in charge of doing the rules and creating the fixture list over here, so I expected some feedback. Especially since during the season I had been getting plenty of stick, but this time everyone was pretty much quiet and kept to their own. I've been a regular in these meetings (missed only 2 of 16 since 2004) lately and to my amazement we had the team building for next years SM-liiga sorted in 30 minutes. SM-liiga rules are: - teams must declare their intention to take part and the riders by December 20th 2011. - Combined average for the team must not exceed 30,00 when entering the league. - Riders will take their place in the team according to their averages as the highest on 1 and so on. - Averages will be updated once half of the meetings are ridden. - a new (extra) heat will start the meeting with every teams reserve rider in it. - R/R stays in place - Foreign U17's will now come on an assessed 7,00 average. (Who's in line on 2012?) Kaupunki Cup was opened to all Finnish riders. The intention of the Cup has been to give riders a crack of racing without anyone lapping them, but it was now opened for everyone. It's both good and bad, only time will tell. The really good ones will more or less likely be out riding abroad, but for riders like Mika Loppi (tight budget) and Niko Siltaniemi (was out for the whole 2011 due to injury) it will make the world of good. Also the organizing club is now allowed to run an extra team in their home match. Further increasing the chance of letting new riders take a spin without having the whole season on their shoulders. Teams must enlist for the Cup until the end of January 2012. I already have one teams list of riders ready. Like mentioned, Niko Siltaniemi was back on the bike a month ago. He had a few spins at Hyvinkää and did OK. No reason not to expect great things of him again next season. SM-liiga was again really tightly contested right till the end. We saw an increase of 30 % in the total crowd in the SM-liiga and 10 % in the KC. It'll be interesting to see how the Finnish format will work in next years league. It had two really good years with average control, now that the rider's on 3 and 4 can be a bit better, we'll see. A new idea of an East vs West meeting was introduced at the AGM. It's sort of stolen from the Finnish baseball, where it's the biggest event of their season. There was also a very interesting sideshow planned to be introduced during the Finnish league and the have it's final at the E vs. W meeting. I think it's an excellent idea, hopefully we can get it going next season. Microspeedway (toddlers on 50cc bikes) is also running in Finland. Vaasa is the benchmark at the moment for anyone interested, since they have around 20 kids riding weekly in their practise sessions. They have 1-3 kids in various cities elsewhere, but Vaasa has been a huge success compared. Also we saw the first Finnish veteran days in speedway, when Harry Lahti (Vaasa) and Risto Flink (Lahti) got their heads together and made it happen. There were 3-4 riding days held and I think they had around 15 different riders taking part. Lahti was very optimistic about the future of these kind of meetings and expects new riders to come along next year. Finnish news for 2011 is now dealt with on my behalf. I'll post iceracing info on the ice racing thread. This thread was on over 80 views per post before this one. Alltough I sort of played it to get it that high, I hope it shows that people are taking more notice of us. With riders like Timo Lahti coming through, You really need to as well... See you!

Like mentioned yesterday, the ice racing nordic fina will be staged at Forssa. The local club are building a track inside the Pilvenmäki trotting track and it will be available for use on six saturdays during the season. Two of them are planned to be meetings, the rest for practise. The track will be built along the lines of the Assen track measuring around 400 meters. Around 20 riders are coming to the training camp at Ylitornio at the start of December. Antti Aakko is not among them, as he makes his comeback in Russia at the same time. There's a training camp somewhere FAR away and Aakko will be there. He's also promised a couple of meetings in the Russian league.

Nordic final (individual) at Forssa on Feb 12th.

If that's the case, another club will step up and pay him 1200 for a point. Only applies to Crump and Hancock though... Just read about this on a swedish websites that says (speculates) that Vaculik and Kasprzak will both say no and Ljung will ride in the GP next season.

I think you are referring to a post from a couple of years back, I remember it. Even though I've not yet seen him in a national level meeting here in Finland, we've met a few times since and had a chat and he's actually been quite helpful. Not taking anything back though from my previous post though. I'm told he got the "job" early this year and his input can be seen already in this seasons fixtures. Whether he'll lift ice racing to new heights or not remains to be seen. I do feel it's a mountain too steep to climb, but good luck to him anyway! He's very positive about the sport (track racing) growing towards East and West, which I'm not (regarding speedway). And my opinion is purely based on the fact that we've already seen it's not working until the Russian goverment does something with their border control. I think I read this week in my local paper that you might get to enter Russia without a visa in the next five years or so... The meeting at Oulunkylä (Helsinki) will be on March 17th, an international/invitational/individual meeting with prize money. The Finnish AGM is this saturday, thats when we'll most likely get the date for the Nordic final.

There's an international meeting in finland also on march 17 th. A busy day...

Here we go again...

Get the picture..? Tomasz, the first drafts of the FIM calendar are doing the rounds already. Not necessarily meaning they are the ones confirmed.

We had frost in the car windows yesterday morning for the first time this fall. I guess that marks it's ok to start talking about ice racing. I spoke with Jouni Seppänen yesterday and heard so much positive about the coming season in Finland that I forgot most of it. The season starter is organised at Yli-Tornio on the first weekend of December. A three day practise with international riders. Forssa has big plans with a new track, as a news it can be almost compared to Eteläpuisto returning. Also a meeting is planned in southern Finland in march thats gonna be big. I'll spill the beans on the lot when someone has said it's ok to do so. But still no dates confirmed, cant do anything about it.