nboy

so nobody has anything to add to the topic, remember the subject? its about the Sky deal ...................

should be so. rider's safety is the most important. there may be track casualties ...

get well soon Steve

is that cos you dont get any? in the spirit of the season, congratulations to Juric and his wife.

great links, thanks guys.

dear promotors how about ring fencing the likely reduced Sky money (as it seems the new EL model has discounted this now anyway). buy the selected young NL 20 x2 each super tuned engines, on a season contract with the BSPA (not club specific) but with an obligation to up their EL average from 3.00 to say 5.00. have a regular weekly contractual training day on a Tuesday at different size tracks, say with Phil M, Gary H, Joes S, etc. in the evening have a bonding session plus cover the fitness, technical, phycological, logistical side of the sport. If they dont make the EL required cut at then end of the season then select from the NL averages at the start of the next season for the next crop and take back the kit to give to the newcomers.

ok, i stand corrected. my other local tracks are rye 16.00 and ippo 15.50 against lakeside 17.00. thanks.

As always 'a big winter of change for the future of the sport' ends up as badly thought out minimal tweaks. Nothing changes, really its business as usual (except regretably PBoro), but with a de-valued EL product year on year. Yet we as paying EL customers bear the brunt of the problems by paying the same for less. Makes no sense to pay to see NL riders getting lapped as they wont just be racing in a couple of ring fenced races, they will have to do TS and RR rides also, in reality. There may be 20 NL riders at the start of the season, but if they are riding in all 3 leagues that could drop to less than 10 by mid season due to the increased risk of injury. What happens then, do we bring in lower quality NL riders that will get lapped twice! And .. all the PL promotors moaning about buying an air fence, low crowds,etc are quite happy with the business model then as technically there are no real changes in the PL? As a Lakeside fan, i will only cherry pick the better meetings as the season develops, unless entry fees drop more in line with PL tracks.

I had the P Sports Swedish package for a year. The two camera setup was pretty basic and the commentry was far from expert. Didn't really hold my interest week on week to be honest, but at least speedway was on TV . I think minority sports will eventually move to web based PAYG basis like Eurosport where the broadcaster can scrape a small margin per person from high volume of subscribers. Sky did report that speedway was their second most watched sport a few years ago but that has dropped off significantly, I guess. Problem with Sky is you have to make a 50.00+ month commitment for the full package even if, like me, you are only interested in speedway. If our future speedway menu is web based, then: saturday GP, SWP and Euro on ESport PAYG web; Sunday Polish on PAYG web; Tuesday Swedish perhaps BT Broadband; Wednesday Danish free web; and you watch a live match once per week; do you need any more speedway!! I certainly dont, so I dont beed a pricey satellite package.

Sky have done a great job getting us to where we are, lets not forget that. If they hadnt been underwriting the GP's from the off they would not exist in the current form, end of. But, it costs money to produce a live UK audience specific meeting and they have to factor in rain offs in their budget also. Being fair, they probably havent done a great job of selling on the UK feed to be honest. Estimates for a single EL/PL live meeting are 100k, covering staff, media trucks and crane hire. Then they have to pay the BSPA +1m for the privelage. It just doesnt stack up anymore for them, or me, based on declining speedway specific customers. Why? Personally, with Eurosport taking on the GP and SWC essentially free (with PC subscription) and adding the Euro, i dont really need a Sky box anymore as my family are not big speedway fans. i get my fill of the top riders in the sport every 2 weeks, if not every week at the height of the summer. I can also watch DK league streamed free on Wednesday, and potentially the Ploish league on a Sunday for a very small fee. I dont need a Sky box any more.