HGould

It's hardly a massacre after 12 heats. But of an over reaction from some. Whatever the reason for Barker not riding will have to come out in the wash as they say. Shame about Bowtell. He'd been riding very well.

Indeed

We did that years ago. We have NEC, NIA and ICC they were staging World and European Championships of sports like Badminton, lndoor Athletics, Table Tennis, Gymnastics etc plus G7 World Leaders when other major cities outside of London called a converted train shed a Conference Centre.

Think that's mischief from one unreliable mischief maker at your Club. Kennetts first love is Grass Track and pretty sure when he is anywhere near fit to return he'd be entered in a Grass Meeting somewhere. Until he is I'd say safe to assume he is not fit.

Gary May is very clever, knows the tricks of the trade, may be he'll pull a replacement for Kennett out of the hat once he knows that Andersen / MPT and Gilkes are fit. That would well and truly upset the applecart! Bowtell has developed in to an excellent second string since going there, they could still end up with 4 heat leaders and Bowtell in the top 5 and Gilkes at reserve with a 2 pointer at 7.

It's certainly an interesting and enjoyable watch. Plenty of passing and incidents and incredibly 30 30 after 10 heats.

I've referred to this on another topic. How long before a rider has ridden for every Club in the CL in this season or even on CL and PL. It must be the case that Heat Leaders on 7-8 point averages are probably by now so fatigued by the miles travelled and laps done that they and their bikes are in no fit state to take every booking offered. Unlike past years most have probably not set foot outside the UK either. PL Monday and Thursday, CL team probabaly oe home and one away per week and guest bookings on nights/days off, 6 days a week for sure (now no Newcastle) but 7 days a week when any other team picks a Sunday. The more extreme places geographically are going to be the first to suffer in terms of getting Guests and same for Away Teams travelling there.

Agree with every word. It pains me to agree with every word but you're spot on in your analysis. We have a generation of over 30's riding who started when money and interest were greater but who now effectively hold the sport to ransom for their guarantees or over-inflated pay rates. That feeds down to a younger generation, few of whom are making real progress but who want more money that Promoters can afford and the trappings of vans and engine tuners - the latter of which are bleeding the sport dry. The few innovative thinkers who have emerged have been broken by the system or their owm nievity of the system or have in the case of someone like Adrian Smith just walked away. God Bless those who try to buck the trend at places like Glasgow, Redcar, Oxford, Plymouth. The Management of the BSPL sit in a parallel universe apparently happy to brag about how much they have lost and had to make good each year; rather than try to plug the drain and to work towards a model that goes back to basics and starts from the bottom based on realistic pay rates, realistic break even figures, realistic level of riders it can attract etc. Riders are worn out in late July not from riding in a 6 team PL and 10 Team CL for a Club in each but for rising for just about every other Club in both leagues at some point. How far are we away from the Rider who steps up and says "I've ridden for every CL and PL Club this season"??.. I used to look forward to going to Brum every week and around 10 away matches around the Country.This year I've done 4 Fixtures at Brum, 2 at Oxford, 1 at Plymouth and 2 at Leicester. Have I come away from any having been actually entertained and actually enjoyed the experience, probably twice if i'm being honest and both at Oxford where at east you get a sense of the buzz and excitement I used to. I bet that will be drained out though before too long. As you have suggested, if we aren't gripped and excitied any more and have become bored and dis-interested, what hope is there. Each year another one or two will drop out, some with good ideas unfulfilled and no doubt having lost a small fortune, having lost the Masons who did some good work, I now fear for our new Promotion who simply can't be making ends meet nor enjoying the stress and hassle of a sport in decline, with no leadership nor direction, largely mercanaries racing the bikes and not enough excitement. THANK GOD for the likes of Josh Pickering who has given me some enjoyment this season, we need more of him and a new wave , but I fear its too late.

Where's Morris, has he lost his coke bottle?

Wouldn't be first time Management Committee have enforced a date (no doubt due to CL play off cut off) and not told or not confirmed to relevant Clubs before changing their own website. If it involves NDL we all know Management Committee treat NDL like a bit of **** of their shoe. Sooner NDL has independent governence the better.

Alex Harkness has done a great job at Edinburgh with John Campbell and possibly the best Supporters Club set up out there in terms of support and fund raising. Alex is entitled to say that as at Edinburgh there is so much right being done and included in that are imaginitive and hopefully successful plans when the bulldozers do move in to Armadale (which is not the fault of the Speedway). No one is kidding themselves the Sport is in deep decline but there are green-shoots None more so than Oxford and Workington, hopefully Eastbourne and Swindon can come back in 2023 or before too long and the losses will be minimal and more linked to land value / developments (like at Peterborough) than losses like at Newcastle. Whether the glass is half full or half empty was probably about 25 years ago, but while a few slops appear in the bottom of the glass we can live in hope.

It'll be for Atkins indirectly then as he was just under 6 average and they had 3 x 3 pointers so points to play with.

Games opening ceremony is night after with a 30000 sell out crowd at Alexander Stadium. Very likely many security measures will be in force day before though. Allow plenty of time

For Atkins surely replacing a 3 pointer who replaced Atkins If any chance Dan can be fit for CL play offs they'll want him to ride NDL to build race fitness

Rule SMCcl/RGDBDF1. If any Rule persuant to a Management Committee Club requires a new rule, an overrule or just sorting pleas raise it for immediate approval by 6pm any day of the year.

nice to see the gating tart Lawson making a pass without maiming someone, shame it needed a broken steel shoe for James Wright though, lovely inside move from Edwards to fly past Cook, that must have bought the house down.

100% 40 DEGREE baking for 2 days! They had 2 opitions (a) call it off and incur the wrath of keyboard warriors (b) run it with a baked surface and incur the wrath of keyboard warrios as they would have said lovely weather conditions perfect. Sometimes you CANT win - in fact in this troll fest social media age can you ever win! Nigel and the Directors and Laurence and his Staff have delivered an excellent surface almost all season, light years better than last. They deserve to be cut some slack under the kind of conditions NEVER seen before in the UK. Some places had markedly cooler weather in high 20's - but 40 degrees in central England (it was 51 in my car Tuesday afternoon on the drive) is off the scale.

So you complain about the blue line! Then you complain not enough water! Have you the faintest idea of what would have happened had you watered that blue line, or worst still put more dirt on and watered that? It's never dusty at Poole is it mmm

Any Speedway rider will tell you they NEVER prefer holes to be "filled in". They would rather see them and be aware of them, good riders can ride through them anyway. Covering them over just makes the situatuin worse as the danger (the hole) is hidden and wet replacement shale that can't be tyre packed in 10 minutes makes a problem even worse! Easy to stand there and pontificate rubbish....reality is very different

Really??...possibly Pickering / Douglas / Nicholls / Batchelor / Harris / Sedgeman ??...

Agreed Worrall a bit harsh in heat 1, Kerr exclusion a clear mistake. That would have been a big 5 1 over Danny.

Good article in the local rag but may be someone should alert their switcboard about a swarm of bum orifices about to call them in disgust! They spelt Ablitt wrong (they have bb)

I agree 100% Im certain that teams were effectively forced to move up after 2018 as the NDL was too strong for some in charge of the sport, and the bigger NDL clubs were threatened with a 35 point limit for 2019 so clubs like mine and Eastbourne would have been decimated. They then made the entry for us both and others later on subsequently ridiculously expensive and from memory only approved both in to the League relatively late, certainly Brummies were late to be approved. Like Plymouth in 2021 only after Somerset pulled out and Kent too in 2021.

I think it depends who/how is funding it. Oxford are doing phenominally well but seem to have a significant budget behind them over a few years and it will be interesting to see how those figues stack up in year 2 if the team sn't delivering better results on the Track. I think too that they are pulling in some support from Swindon, Reading , even Coventry when I was there , that have been starved of Speedway for so long. A far bigger catchment area than Workington as an example. The scenarios of the last few Clubs to either move up or change hands and be in CL, Brummies / Eastbourne / Newcastle seems to be a case of good intentions on limited budgets and possibly a nievity in terms of the costs involved and the cost to build competitive Teams and of course Covid did no one any favours. Hearts ruling heads and the resultant struggles. It may be better to have a low budget and lower breakeven in the NDL for a year, and get everything set up and working before making that move up with some proven indication of the level of support and level of sponsorship. The other plain fact is that it's easier to be a big fish in a small pond especially with a competitive team than it is a little fish in a big pond with a team that's not competitive or good enough to win trophies where fans who mostly want success over the spectacle of the product can quickly drift away and Workington lets not forget WON everything going in 2018 yet still folded as the support had drfted away for whatever reason. The set up at Workington looks fantastic but as someone has said will need to bed in and be gradually improved. Imagine the foundations they could build with 1000 fans in NDL for a year; as opposed to 1000 in CL and just surviving probably.

Hopefully Danny Kling and Nathan Allitt won't be too upset when they do the review