WalterPlinge

To be fair, the confused old fool was in the Fresh Fish aisle at the time. Why would anyone ever have the need to be visiting two different WH Smith branches, in two different towns, in one day? Something smells fishy here (And it isn't the Penge Sainsbury's)

It's nonsense to suggest that Kent need team changes. In fact I'd be nipping down the bookies to get a bet on them winning the play-offs. Gilkes has been a big loss, but he'll be back soon, and once everyone else has had their 2.00 riders gain new averages and move into the main body, he'll be cleaning upat reserve. Kemp is a top quality rider. He had bike trouble and had to ride borrowed machinery for the 1st leg, but was excellent last night. Rowe is also developing into a superb rider. Ledwith was always going to more than double his joke 3.50 assessed average. Spooner was quick last night and will get better and better with an injury free run. Jenkins has been a bit of a weak link, but only through injury. An injury free second half to the season will see him move up the averages. I think Kent heads went down last night when they knew Ablitt was out and they thought they had to cover with a "no hoper". Turned out Luke Mulford was anything but a no hoper, but they'd beaten themselves by the time they found out he was quite useful. The other thing Kent did to beat themselves was watering a bald track and making it greasy. Crazy! Belle Vue always seemed to have someone at the pit gate watching everything, and maybe feedback on track conditions helped them make changes to cope, while the bad track prep backfired on the home riders? A fully fit Kent 1-7 with Gilkes back will hit form just in time for the play-offs. No need for team changes. Get your money on them.

Didn't say it did. Just said you can't have 11 heats with passing and 4 heats with no overtaking in a 13 heat match.

You're spot on with all you say, but I was just querying how a 13 heat match could have 11 heats with passing and 4 heats with no passing...

So in the good old days, even 2 of the gate-n-go-races, won from the gate with no passing, had overtaking?

I'D be more inclined to believe that statement if it came from Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder. And that's a FACT

THE hilarious thing is that he's not even a good troll. To troll well you have to give biased opinion, which people may disagree with, but they can't say you're wrong, because it's a matter of opinion. But this troll makes up stuff that is easily verifiable as untrue, and makes himself look a complete plank. What's most hilarious is when he follows up his made up nonsense with the word "FACT" in capitals. But he's given me a great laugh today with the "I know this is true because I know someone who is a mate of a photographer!" On that basis I have a direct line to the Glaziers as I know someone whose nephew is going out with a girl who works behind one of the bars at Old Trafford.

The Pairs is already down to be held at Stoke, and now they have the Fours too. So instead of neutral venues, Stoke now have the advantage in both. The change will have appeased Cradley who can now have their full top four with Max Clegg now available. But the new Stoke date clashes with the Berwick v Leicester Championship match which means that Belle Vue and Leicester now both lose their No.1 rider with Leon Flint and Ellis Perks now unavailable. That's two of the stronger teams and two of the league's drawcard riders now out of the running. Basically they've took a problem of Clegg and Phillips being missing and swapped it for a bigger problem of having Perks & Flint missing, a non-neutral track, a poorer venue, and the loss of a Sunday raceday. Only way to make it a bigger farce would be to change the rules and let Belle Vue and Leicester have a guest for Flint & Perks.

The NDL doesn't use rolling averages....

Presume BSPA will say the NL 4s take priority over a late Newcastle re-arrangement? Surely the only solution is that Newcastle will have to use guests if Clegg and/or Phillips have been chosen for the 4s In Jason Pipe we trust. I'm sure Mr Pipe will have foreseen this kind of thing happening and will have an agreement with the BSPA in place for priority over riders like the NDLRC has.

Cradley presumably will be without Jack Smith, but would have thought Clegg would be available, as surely the NL4s takes priority over an open meeting? Group B looks the tougher group to me. Leicester should be fairly happy with their draw.

Is he? I don't do Facebook. To be honest I didn't even know the BSPA had an official Facebook page. Why haven't they duplicated the publicity onto the BSPA website? For those without facebook, what info has he publicised? Do we know the two groups or any team line-ups?

Be fair. He did introduce the farce of a NL KO Cup draw. On a plastic christmas tablecloth on his kitchen table, with bits of scrap paper from a cardboard box which came out in almost the same order as they went in. We know that was his idea, because the BSPA/SCB were very quick to distance themselves from blame for it. And he's got a new coat with his name on..... But hey, he's got the showpiece NL Fours coming up soon. 8 teams in the league, so the 2 groups of 4 are easy without needing any decision to leave any team out. Sheffield and Redcar are racing the same day, So will the 4s get priority over Drew Kemp and Jack Smith? Other than those two, can he get each team to track their top four? Or will we get teams leaving top riders out and devaluing the competition with 2 point reserves? 3 weeks to go, but no publicity yet....

What exactly is Cook's position with Eastbourne? He's not a promoter - Mike Bellerby and Trevor Geer are the promoters. And according to Companies House he resigned as a Director of Eastbourne Eagles Ltd on 28/05/19, and ceased to be a shareholder of the company on the same date.

At least the comments of Ian Jordan are a tad more sensible, and he distances himself from the disgraceful comments of Jon Cook. However a bit of digging suggests that the SCB can not take action against Jon Cook, as neither Jon Cook nor Ian Jordan are promoters (Nor are they SCB officials at all). The people who will have to take responsibility for the programme comments which bring the sport into disrepute are the licenced officials Mike Bellerby & Trevor Geer. But I wonder if all is not harmonious at Eastbourne. The promoting company (Eastbourne Eagles Ltd) was formed on 14 December 2018 with Ian Jordan and Jon Cook as the Directors and both as 50% shareholders. Then quite recently on 28 May 2019, Jon Cook resigned as a director, leaving Jordan as the sole director. Cook also ceased to be a 50% shareholder, so it looks like Jordan is now the sole owner.

Riders can (and have been) banned for making derogatory remarks on social media. It'll be interesting to see what action the SCB take against Mr Cook for these disgraceful comments. Perhaps Mr Cook should concentrate his time more on the Eastbourne track and see if he can sort the dangerous surface where the Championship riders struggle to stay on, do four laps, and in some case can barely skid a bike.

That's fair enough as long as people are allowed to place an advanced bid up to their own maximum limit. (Still would have been better to do it online too)

But he is a tool?

This does seem a very naive way of auctioning off potentially valuable items, which would certainly have raised more money if put to a worldwide audience (very easy to do in this internet age). But if it's true that " They add that anyone who can't make it, ask someone on their behalf whose attending to make a bid. " then surely anyone can contact the auctioneer and instruct him to make bids on their behalf up to a set amount. A cynical person might think that the people organising this auction are purposely restricting the audience to try to increase their chances of snaffling the goodies for themselves on the cheap. If they refuse to accept advance bids via the auctioneer, then you know something underhand is going on.

Already been postponed

Is Robinson that berk who used to dress as a foam hammer?

You're making your own rules up! Where has anyone said you have to sack a rider if his average drops? All we're talking about is the rule that you can't bring in another 2.00 rider if your reserve berths are already filled with two 2.00 riders.

Kyle Bickley and Ben Woodhull also joined Belle Vue on the minimum average as a reserve too. So it's a total of 5. (as did Paul Bowen, so it was 6). Leon Flint and Danny Phillips joined the NL on the minimum average, just not with BV. In fact most riders come in on the minimum average. Only those dropping from a higher league don't. (can only think of Ledwith). Of course there is a rule saying that you can only have two 2.00 riders in a team at a time. This is to ensure that a new 2.00 starts at reserve, and isn't thrown straight into the main body. (e.g. BV couldn't have signed Bailey and thrown him into the main body while Palin and Rathbone were still both occupying the reserve berths on 2.00. They had to wait until one or both moved up on a higher average and a space became available at reserve)

It answers where you got the figure from, thanks. And we're now slowly piecing together where the BSPA got the figure from. They seem to have made up an average using matches that don't count in the averages! Thankfully it's worked out OK for Sheldon. If he hadn't got a place at Cradley he could have been practically frozen out of riding NL due to the craziness.

It makes sense that unattached riders get an average after 4 league meetings, regardless of club, to stop them doing a Spooner (and others) by riding odd matches for every team. BUT it has to be official matches (i.e. League only). It's ludicrous to include NT or KOC just for unattached riders. They may very well end up being frozen out before they've even got as far as racing ONE league match, let alone four! With that terrible excuse of a bungled KOC draw, and now this, the new co-ordinator isn't exactly covering himself in glory.