HGould

Quite simply. You cannot create an 8 team PL if (a) no CL Club is prepared to be used as cannon fodder to enable Coleman / Lemon and Morris to create an 8 team PL just to get a few morcels of TV money and (b) it's the height of utter hypocrisy to try to parachute a returning Club, which is the case of Eastbourne (but could be many other examples like Birmingham Brummies!) has relied totally on the financial support of the Dugard family Business for over 80% of existence to bale it out year on year and destroyed within 3-4 years a handful of other outside investors who over many decades in the past have pumped endless sums of money in with good but utterly misguided intent to try to make it pay for a wonderfully loyal group of 600-800 regulars! By following (a) or (b) you are in fact diluting the very product that Coleman / Morris / Lemon are desperately trying to "big up" as a TV product and if that isn't ego driven, I don't know what is. In fact if you are a TV executive looking for an exciting meaningful nationally based product that is competitive and happy to be highlights only with occasional LIVE TV , then the Championship would actually be far more appealing and credible. A newcomer watching on TV would be far more interested in close competitive action staffed mostly by UK riders and not names they can't pronounce nor have heard of from various parts of the globe. The PL is what it is, a 6 team Division trying to live way beyond it's means and desperate to destroy the better product which is the CL.

I think it was 2019, I went to opening meeting with Brummies as we'd both gone up and they reported a crowd of over 1000, I also went to the Good Friday KO Cup with Brummies, baking hot and blue groove and melting free easter eggs, a local I spoke to said it was close to 1500, biggest crowd they'd had in 10 years. I tried to get tickets in 2021 for the opening meeting v Poole to go with my brother who lives in Bexhill, as we were starved of speedway and brummies opened quite late, and I remember having to get online , Brummies and Eagles used the same Ticketing platform I think Eagles had made recommendation to Peter Mason about it, and could not get one as the limit was set at 800? and they had sold out. I think all crowds were Covid restricted and segregated until July that year to advance ticket sales only (Perry Barr definitely was) so I can't see how they could have had more than the set limit anywhere, until July. It would be great to see Speedway back at Arlington but I do agree with the sentiments that it has to be on a weekend and at CL level as otherwise it'll just be set to fail and cost someone a lot of money to soothe the ego of Mr Coleman / Morris and Lemon.

I think that's what the likes of Bewley and Lambert have alluded to. UK on Monday Sweden on Tuesday Denmark on Wednesday More like a Soccer concept - home one week and away the next If they had a spare week every 4th week for rain offs it would allow some form of continuity.

Not picking on you at all Diamonds but generally this logic that "let's go NORA" in the event our Ait Fence is not good enough for SCB / BSPL / ACU frankly sickens me and terrifies me. If the powers that be, rightly or wrongly, say an Air Fence is not fit for purpose for the likes of Scott Nicholls, Chris Harris, Richard Lawson and Sam Masters and other to race, how in gods name can anyone then justify sneaking in a season of NORA for Ben Morley, Jack Kingston , and others who are no longer under the SCB banner and indeed dozens of young riders denied the opportunity to ride there as it's deemed unsafe for ACU / SCB and BSPL but safe enough for an Amateur Body. Just think about the consequnces of somebody suffering a life changing injury under those circumstances and then returning in 2028 with a new Air Fence paid for by Sponsors and Supporters. For that reason alone, I think it sould be 2027 with a new Air fence, or 2028 without a new Air fence. TRAINING with one or two riders not RACING fair enough but full on competitive Racing NOPE! As an aside, a very interesting posting from Norris Norris (Floppy) on Plymouth Facebook... I assume he means his beloved Eastbourne and very telling i think that he believes saving Teams is better than bringing back his old Team as some sort of stunt to prop up an 8 Team League that is looking increasingly like a Coleman vanity and ego project...well said Floppy! He posted "Rather than looking at spending 100s of thousands getting former speedway venues back,, it should be priority for the BSPL to finance the rest needed for the air fence immediately and then let Mark and Plymouth concentrate on building from their amazing 2026 season. Regards Flop xx"

Oxford if Masters goes to Poole Lawson to Redcar

Join the dots Spedeworth Deane Woods said, he's only work with people he knew and trusted. Coleman desperate for a TV deal, it wont be millions but a few hundred grand would help and they would be happy to have a loss making Club to get the TV deal over the line. Track and Stadium waiting and Spedeworth tarting it up and would presumably take bar and food dosh too. Build a cheap team who can be competitive at home stocked with home track specialists. I've a hunch the Front Man could be Chris Louis and backed by Scott Nicholls (who knows Scott may fancy a swan song there he could ride round there in the dark. I think that's more plausible than Nigel Tolley, Ive a hunch he could yet turn up at Sheffield based on a few whispers from Brummies in the know I'm still in touch with. Plenty of rider options that you would just need to add an out and out No 1 to , most of these might be surplus elsewhere? Richard Lawson Adam Ellis Matej Zagar Tom Brennan Jason Edwards Eddie Kennett Drew Kemp Vinnie Ford (RS) They would ideally want weekends and Thursdays might be difficult with summer Wednesday Stocks, Mondays might be the obvious night therefore. Wold Spedeworth shale the outside Stocks track like at Northampton> or put a foam fence in? 8th Track - heres a left field suggetion as in same Ownership! Has anyone considered Mildenhall? --- The last Promotion did innovate very well with kids and media and other schemes so running mainly school holidays may work for them to boost crowds. NDL - run the HG Aerospace Academy ,already at Ipswich 2nd halves on 5-6 weekends to keep locals who would struggle to get there in the week in traffic happy and utilise some up and coming youngsters and a few older hands. I was impressed by them on a visit to Ipswich in the summer. Nobody has ever made money tgere, very few make money in Speeday anyway, build a strong Championship Team who all have home track knowledge add a No 1 and lose 100k or so but recoup TV money . It's probably the best deal in town.

Loaning against future income in Speedway theres a great idea NOT! It seems to be the case that the issue has been raised quite late in the day by a number of issues with the current bags that do seem to take a lot of punishment , particularly on the first bend. I have a recollection the fence is about 10 years old too. May just be that too many bags have been repaired and in terms of rider safety you can't just inflate a suspect bag somewhere else. As they have no other sport there is it possible to consider a foam fence? One thing that may help Plymouth who since arriving in the CL have had some "high earners" is that a lot of those riders are now retiring and it may help them if they can build a far more solid and compact 1-7 with 2 good reserves and no higher end earners like some Clubs have. You do need a decent number 1 and 2 but someone like Batchelor or Jeppeson might suit them well and then get in a solid 3rd heat leader / second string to compliment Barker, like Jason Edwards as an example who seems to have gone a bit stale at Redcar.

The main point for me and something seemingly missed. There was a significant area of deep shale INSIDE the LINE, that seemed to be far more than normal to me. Look at previous Meetings, and recall this has NOT happened at Poole before or if it has very very rarely. I accuse therefore that this "run off" area was especially placed there and it was done in the event it was needed in a key part of the turn , as it would only work once before the Referee paid particular attention to it. Am I accusing poole of cheating YES I am!

The problem with Championship on a Saturday night is that Berwick, Plymouth, Workington already have priority. Similar issues have occured in the past with Friday nights (remember Arena Essex).

have you not considered that unlike those lucky few with Polish Contracts, he probably has one very strong engine, a decent engine and a few that are not competitive at the highest level. His spurts of excellence and mediocrity certainly support that sort of narrative far more than him being inconsistent When we have a few mega talented young 16-17 year olds with mega rich Parents on GP engines its not always easy for others to compete on a level playing field.

Reading various Books and articles it would seem that Speedway was always subsidised by Dugards business when they ran it to the tune of up to 50k a year and that the four or so others who have sub-let, have all lost significant amounts of money. It is ideal for weekend action you'd think but a really hard place to get to without a Car in the week and after work. Ball park 1000 seems to be the guess but of course ball park 1000 in the Championship would probably mean 1500 required in the PL and from all the information available that would seem to have been unachievable since the boom times in the 70's and 80's Whoever takes it on is going to have to have deep pockets, but that applies to almost any Track with the probable exception of Poole and Ipswich that attract the biggest crowds and biggest sponsors.

I'd hope even the dinosaurs at BSPL would relent on geographical issues. I seem to think Armadale is a fair was from Edinburgh, isn't Arlington Stadium in Hailsham, and "Somerset" seems a fairly broad brush. In tems of nights and teams , possibly 2 teams in 2 leagues with different names I dont know. In terms of Sports, possibly have Community Sports Pitches on the centre Green for youngsters (not full size but usable) better still a couple of REVI tracks for every day use in the middle - that's the future.

My apologies. I did not realise it was a combined effort!

This is going to be controversial I know. However, with the West Midlands now being overseen by a Mayor, albeit Street seemed to have far more reach than Parker, and with Birmingham, Cradley Heath and Wolverhampton being within that wider West Midlands and Birmingham Area poses the £64,000 question that will undoubtedly be unpalatable for many but pragmatically the future of West Midlands Speedway. Should the 3 very enthusiastic but separate Groups , all of whom deserve massive massive credit, not form togather to go to the Mayor with a far more compelling vision seeking a central location? While at it that bloke who has been Mayor Of Manchester for a while seems to have a fair bit of clout too?

Having read an excellent "History of" book written about 20 years ago by Ken Burnett and with facts and figures from then and since it would seem that when run by the Dugards - Bob would write-off around £30-50k a year on the family hobby. The Book also details 3 or 4 outside promoters prior to the early 2000's that suffered losses of up to £100k a year and similar ultimate outcome to the most recent one that closed in 2021 , none outside the family control and Company business to bale it out each season lasted more than 3 seasons. One of the issues for leasors of the stadium always seems to have been absolutely no income from food and drink etc which keeps some tracks safe from closure Spedeworth are great benefactors of motor sport but I'd be pretty sure that some sort of deal has been done to ensure Spedeworth get the benefits or some benefits of the Bars and Catering, especially if they are paying to fix them. So Speedway would presumably continue not to benefit from that income stream? The average CL attendences seemed to be at best around 1000, NDL about 500-600 and it's always been a track where PL in the week struggled in the main to attract big crowds, because of the quite large area Crowds are drawn from. You'd think Spedeworth would want to run Cars as many weekends as possible, they seem to run Wednesdays too in the summer, so may be an increase in Stocks and Bangers. PL might be the best option if they can attract the Crowds back. Would Spedeworth consider "Shaleing" the whole place ?, that might actually help Speedway to reduce maintenance and fence erection using the sort of foam based fence at KL which also services Northampton. Is 2027 viable with the huge upgrades needed or is 2028 a more realistic option. At the very least the fact it's back in the game - 4 wheels and hopefully 2 - is very positive news.