Wessex Wanderer

Thanks for reminding us Dave. Agree with the comment that no rider who has given his life for the sport should ever be forgotten. Still remembered at Weymouth as a great rider, best ever captain and a one of the thoroughly "good" guys. RIP Vic

Ref made a terrible decision - it cost me over £100 which I would have won on Jonsson. Corals must have bribed him.

Rune Holta for my captain in round 3 please.

I have bet on the same two geeze. Also got 20-1 on Freddie but only 14-1 on Jonsson at Corals. Don't like to tell you but I have had a few punts on Jonsson in the past and every time he has had a bad meeting. Reckon it must change some time - it is his last chance with me anyway.

Oh how right you are Bavarian. A wonderful opportunity missed. That series really gripped the imagination even though it had to be completed by a combined Norway/denmark team (to allow Ole Olsen to strengthen the Norway team!) and (I think) a Rest of the World team. A regular (every 2 or 4 years) series was there for the taking but, in usual Speedway fashion the chance was missed. I wonder whether international politics had something to do with it - Germany and some of the other Speedway also rans were very influential in the FIM at the time and, of course there was no way at all in which they could have played a major on track part in such an event. One more missed open goal for Speedway.

I want to keep Pedersen please.

My team: 1 Jason Crump £50,000 6 Nicki Pedersen £45,000 (captain) 7 Rune Holta £35,000 9 Freddie Lindgren £35,000 13 Jarek Hampel £25,000 Total: £190,000 Thanks for running this - much appreciated

Should be a very competetive year. Much harder to predict than for a good few years. Anyway - my 1 to 11: 1 Mildenhall 2 Newport 3 Bournemouth 4 Buxton 5 Kings Lynn 6 Dudley 7 Plymouth 8 Rye House 9 Weymouth 10 Scunthorpe 11 Isle of Wight Don't take too much notice of Wessexboy. After giving Mr Ladbroke a fortune in bets on Rune Holta, when he decided not to bet on him for the first time ever in a GP I won £250 on him for a £10 bet!!!

I thought the name Chads came from a card game of the immediate post war era. It featured "Mr Chad" looking over a wall saying "What no ......" with a different ending on every card. Can't remember what any of the missing items were and have absolutely no idea of the rules but the general theme of the game would seem to fit in well with the rationing in force at the time. Can't be more specific as I was only a very young child then so it was all a bit before my time. And I don't get to say THAT very often these days!!! As far as Kilroy is concerned I too have always understood it to be the US Navy story (was Kilroy originally a stores checker). His popularity in the UK was enhanced by the singer Joe Brown who always made a number of references to him during his act.

There was one in the Tiger about this time. It was about "Ace" Lester and the Beldon Aces. There has been a recent thread on the same subject so you can probably find it in the archives. Great times. Great memories.

I know there have been references to individual clips from Pathe News on here but cannot recall one generally about their site. The URL is http://www.britishpathe.com/index.php and if you enter the word Speedway in the search box it comes up with some very interesting items. I had a look at clips from a 1933 Test, Jimmy Gooch in forces racing in Hanover, various World Finals, a Belle Vue wartime meeting, other Tests and Rye House post war training sessions. Be warned though, once you get started you will be glued to your computer for the rest of the day!!!! Again, apologies if I am posting something everyone is aware of but it would be a terrible shame for regulars in this section to miss all that wonderful history and nostalgia. :)

Don't know much about a naked Speedway riding Enid Blyton but as a regular reader of The Tiger 50+ years ago I do remember the weekly story of Ace Lester and the Beldon Aces. Don't remember too much about the plots except that "Ace" had to join the secret service or something so he trained a look alike junior to take his place as star man in the Beldon team in just a couple of weeks!! England could do with a few like that now. The junior was the real hero of the story. One of Ace's training methods was to rig uo a bucket of water above the starting gate which tipped up at the same time the gate was released. The junior either gated or got wet.

Good luck in your appeal Ian. I only ever visited East Bolden once (a 60-18 thrashing for the Wizards - ta very much) but it did seem to have a lot of potential. I think your "asset stripping" theory of 1964 may be very close to the mark. That was a pretty decent team which just required a bit of time to settle down - Jim Airey, Gordon Guasco, Ken Sharples, Graham Coombes and Colin McKee (can't remember the others - maybe Maury McDermott and Dave Collins??) were all good riders who proved very useful for their future teams. One good thing about your 1974 closure was that Bob Hughes quickly snapped up Vic Harding who rapidly progressed from reserve to become one of Weymouth's all time best and most popular riders. Hoping to see Sunderland back in Speedway sometime in the future.

Tony If it is microfilm then it is just a case of aligning the page and pressing the print button. If it is fiche then the Colindale people should be able to produce copies of pages you give them details of. Might have to have the latter forwarded through the post but shouldn't be too much of a delay. Hope this helps.

Always thought so Norbold but am also always open to correction.

QUOTE (Robbie B @ Jul 4 2009, 09:40 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> You're right there iris123, maybe we should only count riders who rode in more then a special one meeting, to find out who had the longest riding career. Agree with you Robbie but it is still a pleasure to read these mentions of some great old timers. Particularly like the mentions of Wal Morton, he was a true unsung hero of Speedway. Maybe an honourable mention should go to Phil Bishop. Although not in consecutive seasons he nevertheless rode in the original High Beech meeting in 1928 and also appeared in the main event of an ordinary regular meeting at Weymouth in 1963. He only lasted about a lap and a half and broke yet another couple of bones but that still makes 35 years from first to last meetings. By the way he insisted that the first aid guys carried him off on the stretcher shoulder high so that he could wave to the crowd! They don't make 'em like that any more!!

According to a very good article by Andy Westlake in Classic Motorcycles, Lew actually started racing pre-war. He officially retired in 1978 but was still riding regularly in past masters races in 1992 when he was into his 70's. Of course this was grass track racing rather than speedway, in which he rode (of and on) from the 40's to the 60's. His Weymouth Training Schools ran from the mid 1960's to the demise of the old Wessex Stadium track in 1985. Always a pleasure to talk about Lew. When last I saw him (about a year ago) he didn't look much different than he had back in the 60's.

Good God - a decent original question and interesting thread descends into a nasty little squabble about a petty point as to what constitutes a relation!!!!!! DOES IT BLOODY WELL MATTER? If some of you think something "counts" and others think it "doesn't count" then so what??? Just be happy with your interpretation and let the other person be happy with theirs. Its hardly going to change the fate of the World is it???? Only in Speedway ..........................

Pity Edmund Migos never rode in the BL - he was their most entertaining and hardest (and sometimes, frightening!) rider of all. Of those in the BL the one that always springs to mind is Zenon Plech.

1 Dennis Sigalos 2 Kelly Moran 3 Bobby Schwartz

Pleased to hear this as Dennis Sigalos was one of my all time favourites.

Yes, he did ride for New Cross 'B' at Weymouth in 1963. Scored 5+1 from 5 rides on Friday 21 June in a match which was drawn 39-39. A certain Terry Stone scored 5+2 from 4 rides then beat Eddie in heat 2 of the second half to reach the final. Don't have the result of the final except that it was won by John Mills. Another interesting point about the meeting was that the second half included Edinburgh second halfer Bert Harkins who was on a self funded tour of southern tracks to gain experience. Bert reached the Final but I have him down as retiring during the race (expensive mechanical problems I seem to remember).

Hi Parsloes From memory only (so well open to correction): The only league match between Poole and Weymouth was at the Wessex in the Scorchers short 1955 NL2 season before they folded. (BobC and co are still celebrating their very lucky win that time - it was only by about 30 or 40 points!) Since then the teams have met at the Wessex for a number of challenge or fours matches but the only "League" meetings involving the pair were the Weymouth v Newpool match in the 1964 Metropolitan League and the return match which was staged at Newport. However, in the early 80's a "National League Select" team rode at Poole against a Pirates team short of a couple of their regulars. The NL team just happened to be the Weymouth team of the previous night's match at the Wessex but they could not be called Weymouth due to the inter league rules of the time!!!! Stupid bloody rules in Speedway are nothing new!!!!!! I can't offhand remember the year but it could very well be the same year as Wiggy finished 3rd in the Blue Riband (surely one of the best NL individual performances of all time). Hope this helps.

I agree with Ian. The Silver Sash was a great innovation for the Provincial League. It was a crowd puller in its own right and always brought an extra "buzz" to meetings. Tony Lewis held it for a while at Poole and the Sash defences seemed just as important as the matches. Can't remember why it was dropped in BL days but I think it lost its appeal when various "rules" were introduced which detracted from the plain and simple situation when in the PL. Might be wrong there (memory sometimes dodgy these days!) so am quite open to correction if I am wrong!!

In the early days of the BL2 someone had a look at Ramsgate dog track. Not knowing the area at all I don't know whether this would be the same as the Dumpton track. Strictly from memory I seem to remember that it was the Wally Mawdsley/Pete Lansdale duo who were doing the looking (possibly at the time they relocated Weymouth to "Rochester" and Romford). Would be a bit ironic if so, considering Wicked Wal's later objection to Dan McCormick's plans.