Parsloes 1928 nearly

Well clearly not with '95 coz that was the first year of the GPs: and Nielsen did indeed win!!!

They've ALWAYS been dull... A 'lowest common denominator' system to decide a World Champion will always lack the drama, sudden death excitement of a traditional final. The GP system is rather like FIFA looking back over the results of international fixtures over the past four years and declaring Spain (or Brazil or whoever...) as Football World Cup winners rather than bothering having a Finals competition... There is only one overhaul...: that's to consign the GPs to history and restore a proper open-to-all world championship.. And before anyone says you can't make changes like this, turn your mind back to the mid-'90s, huge changes were made then and they CAN be again... Throwing out the World Final was a bit like giving away the family silver... A trip to the pawn shop to get it back is in order...: right now!!

In '74 PC won both the Internationale and the European Final - both world class fields at least as good as the final in Gothenberg where he didn't do so well. In '75 only some muppets invading the Wembley track to go mad with a hosepipe denied him a proper crack at Olsen in that WF - over a series he'd have been a definite threat. And in '78 the sugar' put in his tank in the British Final meant he didn't qualify for the Final: a tragedy and a disgrace.. As for you keep saying he wouldn't have won in '77 - that's bananas. PC was head and shoulders best in the world in '77..

No - you're completely wrong about Michanek. He WAS supreme in '73 and - in this 'game' - would clearly have won a GP series that year. Don't know where you get this idea from that he was weak in the big events. He won several World championships and major WC rounds - at Pairs, WTC and Long Track. As well as bouncing back from, yes, a very disappointing WF in Poland to win convincingly in '74 and finish runner-up in '75: dropping just two points out of ten WF rides in those two years! 1977 was certainly PC's year but he was also dominant in '76 - including beating Mauger in the Inter-Continental Final: PC beating Mauger in a Wembley run-off as he had in '74 too.. Ivan's deluding himself to think he was the best rider in the world in '76..: he knows he 100% certainly wasn't in '77 and so thinks that he can theorise about '76 and get away with it... he can't!! I know we're not there yet but to me GP wise, it would've been Michanek in '73; too close to call between Michanek & PC in '74; and then a shoo-in for Collins in '75 through to '78.

Well in all honesty there ain't a SINGLE one of us (you including JH, even at your advanced years!! ) who ever saw the late Mr. Farndon ride so really how could we possibly comment...

Hmm, but even with a shin bone newly smashed to pieces, PC still finished ahead of Olsen in the rain in Gothenberg... Peter was different class in '77..: simply the greatest rider the world has EVER seen...

Way off with '77...: unquestionably Collins' year!!!

Norbold's is correct!! He is always right - though don't listen to him when he talks about my driving...!!

Fair point! Simmonds and Atkin then... Not sure Buzz will be fit after his recent crash...

Ah, all very well...: but Roy Barwick and Paul Gilbert acheived the real peak of riding a Speedway career...: they went onto ride for Crayford!!

Or if it didn't the Dagenham Dales certainly would...!! Hmm, "Dagenham Dales" has something of a ring to it...!!!

That IS an excellent idea!! I'll say it was the Cumbrian Dales branch!!

Rob: I really wish I could but dare I say it, I'm decorating the bedroom!!!! Hopefully 2010 I can get up to Worky/Northside!

Is this in the Cumbrian Dales, Mimmo..??!!

And quite right too.. I think Speedway historians should totally ignore any daft retrospective dictate from the FIM...: clearly this WAS an official World Championship...

QUOTE (Robbie B @ Sep 6 2009, 12:55 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I remember that after a lateish meeting, walking down Blackshaw Road, with the cemetery beside you was well eerie when I was younger, on my way getting a 155 bus back to Kennington. If that bus went via Streatham it's a certain bet that speedyguy was aboard!!!

Indeed - say a Four Team tournie with quartets from each NL club riding on a Sunday afternoon at sunny Poole Stadium ..!!? Or has that idea already been suggested and knocked back..?! As you say too, rabs, a good looking line-up and one that would certainly be enhanced by Jerran Hart too.. Of the holder, Master Compton...: surely he's not ridden enuff matches for the Wildcats to be Weymouth's 'top man'. Perhaps someone could do, what couldn't happen there on Saturday night, and "shed some light" on the Weymouth selection situation..!! Sadly can't be Buzz as he's out injured now.. Talking of Buzz, I recall when he was with Cleveland a couple of years back he gave up his allocated CLRC place to allow a younger rider to take his place... I wonder if the likes of Simmonds and Allott in this field might think to do likewise..?? Anyhow see you there - get there early to stand any chance of that legendary fish'n'chips!!

I think you should've waited a little before making this judgement..? Perhaps until we'd got as far as the 1958 Final...!!!

Being involved in Speedway and seeing the conduct of some who run the sport has many disappointments (god knows there's been plenty I've endured - not least the past couple of weeks..) but I have to say that Bryn over this issue is one of the most disappointing.. Imagine the scenario. From 2005 onwards I’ve faced constant snide digs from Bryn (and yes, Rob too...) about ONE tiny mistake in the Wimbledon programme involving helmet colours (though interpreted by Bryn as being about gate positions..). I held up my hands at the time to this tiny error but the constant jibes have nevertheless continued.. Imagine then my amazement, turning to quiet satisfaction when at - amazingly - the exact same event four years on, it was pointed out to me by those I was with (who knew the abuse and jokes I'd suffered over this..) that a programme produced by the self-same person who'd dished out all of this..;, contained actually several mistakes involving gate colours and was so confusing by omitting helmet colours that numerous races were delayed as pit officials tried to get their heads around these errors. I could scare believe it; but my predominant emotion was one of amusement. Chance to have a laugh here and get my own back.. Ah but no - hasn't turned out that way has it... The hypocrisy is one thing but the po-faced contempt that prevents Bryn from even addressing the issue let alone (1) making a joke of it (which naively is what I'd expected); or (2) even - shock! horror! - holding his hands up to the irony of the situation. Well, it’s pretty hard to take... I don't expect a reply; and I don't expect your standing, ‘Saint Bryn’, among those with any sense of fair play to have been enhanced much either...

That's right... Biggs and Boyce being the only two who lost a run-off for the title and didn't even get a runners-up slot out of it...! I did miss out Langton from the very first final though... Odd that I missed that as it was surely THE most infamous run-off of all time..

One of only FIVE riders to lose a run-off for the title in a WF who never actually won the thing; and one of only two of these (Waterman being the other...) to finish on the rostrum again after the run-off failure, so that puts him up there and abouts.. It would be SIX, but as Moran was later stripped of his silver medal due to 'drugs' seems prudent to leave him out...

Tony recently reappeared riding in a Short Track UK meeting. I'll look up the details, Phil.. I should know off the top of my head but it's late and you know me old grey cells are on the way out!!!!

Hmm, well in Bluey's case surely not that many, as sadly he was dead before 1940 was up.. You'd obviously know this as I know you've read Dr. Belton's excellent biography...!!

Mind you he still finished SECOND in that '75 World Final - so his 'plan' to relinquish the title nearly didn't work out too well..!!!

Spot on arnie. We agree so much (even on choice of prog. boards! ) that people will start to talk!! You can't get better than THIS list of "best" riders not to be World Champs. On the purely empirical test of number of rostrum positions without ever being on the top step, Gollob is head and shoulders above the others. Plechanov's one of only two riders only to be runner-up twice but never champ: the wonderful Split Waterman's the other. Duggan and Parker dominated in years when there was no championship. Plech was also twice on the rostrum and really should've been the Polish champ that was ordained in '73. Moran's I can't agree with you - but then I think that was your little jest!! Anyone who remembers Michanek at this prime will know that, yes, he was without doubt the best in the world in '73 and '74 and would easily have won a GP series in those years. Oh, and Havelock won ALL of the major rounds in his world Final winning year BTW, so no reason at all to diss his credentials as a world champ. On the other hand would competing in six 'rounds' and winning NONE of them make someone a worthy champ..?! That's what England's las "world champ" managed.. I'm sorry to say it, especially with his Kentish connections but there's no question that the LEAST deserving World Champ in history is our own Mark Loram...