NorthamptonKnights

Michael Lee .......... Bo Peterson ................ Bruce Penhall ........... BRETT ALDERTON, who sadly lost his life following a crash at Saddlebow Road in April 1982, just as he started to reach his potential - a "good bloke" as well as a great rider.

Brands Hatch originally started out as a grasstrack venue ... and (as someone else has mentioned), Silverstone has been used for grasstrack in the past ... Santa Pod is still the "home of European Drag Racing", with crowds on the up again - plenty of space there, but only reachable by car/motorbike (ie no public transport within easy distance) - and I can't see the promoters being too enthusiastic about building a speedway track I'm afraid, they're probably only interested in vehicles that travel in straight(ish) lines!

Sean, you little tyke, your dad was an ok rider - not one of the tops, but always willing to "give it a go". He rode 4 NL matches for MK, for an average of 4.00 points - including one race where he pushed home for best part of a lap to earn a point! Most memorable thing about him - everything was red - his bike, his leathers, his boots, his helmet (until he got a new-fangled Bell Moto Star) ... especially his hair! I've got great memories of spending the day at Saddlebow Road with him and his mate Robbie Trezise ... I was fuelling and oiling the bikes, they were taking part in a training school meeting with 12 other (mainly British) junior riders of that time. Oh, and his favourite saying was a quote supposedly from Ron Wilson, the MK promoter at the time ... "Stay down, it's good for the crowd"! Good old Ron - who else out there can remember the evening they carried his "wallet" on to the centre green at Groveway on a stretcher?

The main race track at Crystal Palace was a 'road race' track, used by many different types of racers; the last ti,e I visited the Palace (for a "Custom Car" show at the pool/sports centre back in the mid-70s) you could still see part of the tarmac track. I doubt whether this was the site of the speedway track .... unless someone else out there knows different!

My first speedway meeting was also at Plough Lane - 2 friends from college (one a Hull fan, t'other from Exeter) persuaded me to go along with them to the "Southern Riders Championship Final" in (I think) 1976, or thereabouts. I was hooked from Race 1! I'm pretty sure that I still have the programme somewhere (probably at my parents' home), but if anyone wants to remind me of the details ..... While living in London I frequently visited Wimbledon, Hackney, Rye House, Canterbury, Crayford, Eastbourne and (especially) Milton Keynes; when I moved up to Northampton in '82, my haunts changed to MK, Peterborough, Coventry and Oxford. I rose to the dizzy heights of chairman of the MK Speedway Supporters Association for 12 months, as well as running a fan club for Steve Payne, and often helping out as pusher/flag-waver/pit crew at Elfield Park when it was Bob Humphreys' training track. Nowadays? I'm sorry to say that I don't visit speedway as often as I should ... Why? The increased cost of watching ... being out of touch with the names of modern riders ... being unimpressed by the attempts of modern 'promoters' to push this wonderful sport forwards (it says something when you hear a steward say "I pity anyone who paid to watch this crap"!). But I still prefer the 'lower' racing leagues (much as NL was always better than BL) for a better standard of RACING.

MANY thanks for the information! You've also explained WHY i was there - the Knights (RIP!) were there! Do you, by any chance, have details of the meeting?

Didn't go for another 8 years probably cos you were scared of the noise, just like the time I took you to the Nene Valley Railway, with Jp & Kt, and you tried to run and hide when the big bad steam engine chuffed into the station!

I'd love to find out about the Dons' fixtures for April 1985! Why? This might seem rather morbid, but all the recent talk about the 20th anniversary of the Heysel Stadium disaster rekindled my poor aching memory cells ... I'm 99% certain that I was at Plough Lane, watching a speedway meeting, the night Heysel happened! I'm sure I remember watching the disaster 'unfold' on a TV screen in one of the bars ... but my memory ain't as good as it used to be! Can anyone confirm that there was a meeting that evening?

Sorry I'm late joining this particular party, but here's the list of the best 7 riders I've ever watched in action since 1975 or so (no particular order, so I've not numbered them!): Ivan Mauger Hans Nielsen Dave Jessup Michael Lee Bruce Penhall Billy Sanders Ryan Sullivan ... and an Honorable Mention for Andy Grahame, who qualified for both the NL Riders Final and the BL Riders Final in the same year, riding for MK Knights (big cheer!!!!!!!!) and Birmingham I could then go on and list my top 7 NL riders, but ..............

CRIBBY on his ice speedway bike? Saw him ride at Brandon in Rick Miller's Testimonial meeting (at least I think that's when it was!) ...... blew my mind the way he smashed the track record without any effort, and looking more like a road-racer than a speedway racer. FANTASTIC

To get away from Coventry riders of days-gone-by, Bob Humphreys (ex Reading, Swindon, MK) was last heard of riding "classic" motorcycles on road-race tracks Down Under.