TwoMinuteWarning

Just one way that he is trying to drag our 1950's sport into the 21st century. If all that's wrong with Tai is "what he looks like", then he hasn't got much to worry about. But some will whinge about anything! OAP

Home Depot Stadium at http://www.lagalaxy.com/stadium

There were some Spanish riders pre-war, racing in the bullrings of Madrid and Barcelona. Not at the same time as the bulls, presumably. A team of 4 Spaniards rode at Wembley in the late 1920's and were well beaten.

Agreed. Host nation should be seeded to the Race-Off, NOT to the Final.

Wouldn't have thought so, as I first heard about this Test 3 or 4 months ago, but I hope you are right. Were you listening to the German commentary? As I don't recall any mention of this on the English commentary.

Tickets were available on online for 35 zlotys (7 GB pounds). Scott - Freddie Lindgren (and Lukas Dryml) are not riding because they have a more important meeting at Eastbourne right now.

This is the track that had 15,300 near capacity crowd for a league match last Sunday. And can someome tell Scott that yes, Adrian Miedzinski rides for Torun as we keep being told, but so does Gollob!

PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!! DO NOT SHOW RESULTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THEY MAY ACTUALLY SHOW THE RACING ONE DAY SOON!!!!!!!

Is this some sort of practical joke? Are they taking the p*** out of our sport?

at Marketa Stadium, Prague CZECH REPUBLIC Ales Dryml Lukas Dryml Josef Franc Matej Kus Vaclav Milik Zdenek Simota Tomas Suchanek Roman Cejka POLAND Tomasz Gollob Jaroslaw Hampel Krzysztof Kasprzak and probably Adrian Miedzinski Maciej Janowski Przemyslaw Pawlicki Patryk Dudek

To those of us who no longer have a team to support (I'm ex-Wimbledon), the more "scattered" nature of the club news has made me read more, rather than less, of those news items. I preferred the old system of having all match reports in league order, but it's no big deal. Would like to see junior/second-half matches get the same reports and heat details as the senior matches each week. Current junior coverage is patchy. I'm also surprised that there is rarely/never any coverage of amateur meetings (Scunny, Lydd, Northside etc) I also like the team pics on the back cover, though that must be difficult with all the injuries, guests and doubling-up in teams these days. It's a steal at just over 2 quid a time. Please print a blank scorechart for people to use when watching EL on TV, like you do for the GP. Or maybe the BSPA wouldn't like this as it may reduce programme sales? And, for someone with a big interest in the history of the sport, the Star documents that history in hard copy, which is invaluable. Information on the web is fine, and is here today ... BUT possibly gone tomorrow.

Ryan Fisher to partner Greg, I think? Jan Staechmann doing pits interviews

Just hope that most of them DONATE TO TAI & CANCER RESEARCH at www.justgiving.com/taiwoffinden01008

Interesting to note that Josef Franc qualified as the wild card at the Prague GP by winning the Marketa Open Championship meeting at Prague on April 30 (see latest Speedway Star).

If there is no Sky TV money next year, I think it WILL come to cutting top riders pay. Which will result in less top riders. Which will result in smaller crowds. Which will result in ... don't wanna go there ....

The Berwick meeting is still on next Tuesday according to the Sky on-screen TV Guide

Fair point. Just to say that the Arlington bank holiday meeting was Bangers and Superstox, not Brisca F1 as shown on Premier Sports each week. To my knowledge, Spedeworth must have been running stocks at Arlington for about 50 years now!

Stock cars are an "entertainment" really, not a true sport. Ask the bank holiday 5,000 crowd who won the main events, and I'd be amazed if more than 1 in 20 knew the answer. Stock cars normally run on Wednesday nights at Arlington, when crowds I'm told are 1,500 to 2,000. Mums and dads love it, and of course the kids love all the crashes and bangs. Nothing wrong with that, I'm sure its a fun afternoon out. Speedway is a 1-minute race which has a 50% chance of being boring and processional, followed by 5 minutes of, well, nothing. Not what young families expect from an evening's sport in the 21st century, I'm afraid. By the way, stock cars on Wednesday nights could make it difficult for Eastbourne to stage Sky matches now.

Teams for the 2011 (Torun) and 2012 (Gorzow) matches were very strong - see http://www.internationalspeedway.co.uk/polvrow.htm

Now, THAT'S a race track! (Promoters please take note)

But Vladimir was born in Ukraine, yes?

Meetings, and each heat, are started when the riders and the referee are ready, it seems to me. Just part of the generally poor presentation these days. In the early days of the sport, some tracks had start times against each race in the programme, as is done with greyhound races. Can't really see that catching on these days!

Going to a speedway meeting in the 21st Century is like entering a time warp, or an episode of the "Goodnight Sweetheart" TV series. I first went to speedway in the early 1960's - very little has changed! The bikes are faster (TOO fast), there are air fences now, and coloured leathers. None of which turns the all-to-often mundane speedway meeting into a 21st century entertainment, or improves the standard of racing. Speedway needs a massive injection of capital - but I can't see where it's coming from. The promoters do their best - but with very limited money available. Speedway basically hasn't changed since the 1960's. The paying public's expectations have.

By NOT giving double points for the final, you are increasing the likelihood of the winner of the final not being the top point scorer in the meeting. Dosen't bother me too much, but several people have complained about this in the past.

This will mean that we get even more meetings where the winner of the Final is not the top point scorer. And still no points reward for a rider reaching the semis and then finishing 4th. I'd like to see scoring 4-3-2-1 in semis and 6-4-2-1 in Final (non-finishers to score 0)