MrMungo

Unless you're behind Peter Juul Larsen...so it seems. Racing has been much better over the last few heats after a slow start

Iversen having a tough night so far! Thornblom looked good in that one

I have had 1 or 2 blips, but nothing major here.

I haven't been for a few years now, and it does look like it has changed a fair bit, but the main parking when i've been has always been in the field you mention. Always fun when it has rained! I'd consider Holsted & Grindsted to be more of a local derby, though. Outrup and Esbjerg are within an hour's drive, aswell, so you have 4 tracks that are all quite close to each other.

Sorry guys! Must have had Fjelsted on my mind for some unknown reason! :/ Must be losing it! Iris is right, as per the norm. It's Grindsted & ESBJERG tonight. It's probably the plugin required, G the Bee. Don't worry, it's nothing harmful.

I concur, Iris. I remember a match I went to a few seasons ago. Kylmakorpi was riding at 3 for one (can't remember which) and Leon Madsen was riding for the others. They were both riding at number 3. Kylmakorpi was looking good, but was up against Madsen in practically every single heat he was in, and Madsen was flying that day! It's not a format I am that keen on (I prefer 7 man teams if only 2 teams are riding) but it does seem to work quite well. You don't come across that many huge wins in the top league. I don't know why they changed the DS league either. I know some people have been quite critical of the 4 team matches, due to a lack of riding as a team, but it always worked well I thought. The one good thing about that format is that it was nearly always competitive. Sometimes the top team were too good, or there was a team that was outclassed, but it was always close score wise between 2nd or 3rd, or 3rd and 4th, etc. And there was more races too! But anyway, onwards and upwards. Monday night sees Fjelsted visit Grindsted at 5.30pm UK time. Grindsted have made 2 changes to the side that lost at local rivals Outrup. Kenneth Bjerre comes in to replace his little brother. They've also brought in 19 year old Swede Mathias Thörmblom. Fjelsted have decided to rest Leon Madsen, so Mikkel B Jensen takes over the captaincy. Peter Juul is their D rider for the meeting, and he has plenty of experience at Grindsted and could be bit of a trump card down at reserve. (Now watch him score 0000!) Expected line-ups for the meeting: Grindsted 1 Kenneth Bjerre (A) 2 Michael Jepsen Jensen ( 3 Linus Sundström ( 4 Mattias Thörmblom ( C) 5 Johannes Kikkenborg (D) Fjelsted 1 Niels-Kristian Iversen (A) 2 Mikkel B Jensen ( 3 Patryk Dudek ( 4 Steen Jensen ( C) 5 Peter Juul Larsen (D)

Denmark is CET, so 6.30pm there is 5.30pm here in the UK. Good to know the stream is back. It was down the last time I checked.

I think he's bit of a regular at Scunthorpe's amateur meetings. He came 2nd to Jerran Hart (and above Phillips) at the most recent Amateur meeting.

Can anyone recommend any decent/reasonable hotels in or near Gorican, Croatia?

Here's the PDF from the most recent meeting. http://speedway-league.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/500-05-01-2012-OSC-GSK-1.pdf It's far from ideal, but it shows the format. 14 heats - 13 & 14 are nominated. The number 4's race against each other 4 times! That's the format for the top league. The 1st Division (effectively 2nd Division) have a new format, which is raced between 3 teams.

The weather forecast on Wednesday actually looks pretty decent. Technical error perhaps? Hopefully not! Based on the first leg, I suspect the teams will line-up as: 1 James Cockle 2 Brendan Johnson 3 Lewis Kerr 4 Adam Lowe 5 Jake Knight R/R 6 Tom Stokes 7 Scott Campos 1 Cameron Heeps 2 Cameron Heeps Joe Jacobs 3 Stefan Nielsen 4 Daniel Halsey 5 Lewis Blackbird 6 Nathan Stoneman 7 Josh Bates Mildenhall have a 15 point lead from their home leg.

"With only eight riders allowed in each National League squad it is Richard Franklin - who would have rode for the Saints at the Eddie Wright Raceway on Easter Monday but for the intervention of the weather - who makes way for Hart." From the Scunthorpe website

The following meetings are due to be shown during the month of May. 2/5 Holsted V Fjelsted 7/5 Grindsted V Esbjerg 9/5 Slangerup V Fjelsted 11/5 Outrup V Slangerup 14/5 Grindsted V Holsted 16/5 Danish Final @ Holsted 30/5 Holsted V Esbjerg (from www.speedway-league.com)

Yes! The Scunthorpe home leg! Although both were great adverts for NL racing. Scunthorpe kept the signing of Hart rather quiet! I guess he was signed to cover for the possible unavailability of Worrall/Irving. Either that, or they have changed their minds regarding the whole youth development thing. Oliver Greenwood broke his collarbone a few weeks back, so I guess he is rather doubtful, but you never know with these young kids. Morley/Pickard/Sargeant probably look like the best available guests, and hopefully they'll move Clegg into the side too.

Don't think Crump will be complaining with a start like that!

I concur with much of what you say, Steve, however, I don't think Holder's pass on Gollob had anything to do with them "knocking 5 bells out of each other". Holder clearly noticed that Gollob was carrying far too much speed into the corners, he was struggling to keep the momentum going coming out of the bends and Holder said "thank you very much"!

Why on earth were the Polish fans booing? Weird! Great close GP, great final. Congrats to Holder who looked super fast towards the end of the meeting

Not in heat 14 though! Holsted V Fjelsted (Nicki V Hans) next match. 2nd May i think they said. The Outrup V Grindsted gets repeated numerous times over the weekend. http://kanalsport.dk/programoversigt for more information. (times are CET, of course) I assume all repeats will be viewable on the website, but not 100% sure.

Heat 10 up next. They just got fed up with showing the heat 10 bets I guess, so they moved onto heat 11.

Meeting held up at the moment due to the paramedic(s) attending to a spectator. Before that, there were lots of complaints regarding track conditions, so they had a lengthy track grade.

@ www.kanalsport.dk 14 meetings have been confirmed for the 2012 season with Outrup V Grindsted being shown at the moment.

The financial aspect is of course true, Vog, but to be the best of my knowledge, Buxton haven't moved their track during the winter, so it was always going to be the case! Surely he would've thought that through before signing? Making ends meet in the NL is virtually impossible @ 10/10 (per point/per mile) unless you have excellent sponsors, or extremly deep pockets. However, it is a good apprenticeship, and for 99% of riders it is necessary to move onto the next level. It was calculated by a PL rider during last season that when taking into account all of the costs involved, you aren't breaking even until you're a 5pt PL rider. It's a costly sport, sadly. Hopefully Buxton can get another rider slotted in in the near future.

Think both teams might be up against it on Sunday. Against the weather! Forecast doesn't look too great at all. Can't wait for the summer! If it does go ahead, can only see a confidence boosting win for Mildenhall.

Not a fan then I guess, BW Double? It did surprise me when I read about it in the Star this morning, especially the reason given. Many riders have gone to tracks they have previously struggled at to become better riders. Some have been successful at it, others haven't. It's a shame it's not worked out for Webster and Buxton, but hopefully Buxton can sign up a decent heat leader in his place. I don't think a lack of riders would be a problem. The NL went from 10 to 8 teams during the winter, so in theory there should be a good dozen or so riders available (most are decent reserves, or second strings though), but judging from what was written in the Star, getting a heat leader to ride for £10 a point is a bigger issue. There are riders out there though. IOW have recently signed Kyle Hughes as a temporary replacement, and I imagine he has a similar average to Webster. There's also one of R Worrall/Birks/McKinna, or whoever Stoke don't have in the side at the moment. Have Allott/Taylor/Hargreaves/Courtney/Evans all retired?

I thought the ref did well all things considered. If a rider falls and is back in the re-run, he should be allowed sufficient time to check for any machinery issues and to repair them if possible. The ref should give riders a fair amount of time, and not just stick the 2 minutes on straight away for the hell of it. I can't remember the exact time when the meeting finished but I guess it was about 10.30pm? 3 hours to stage 25 heats with the various falls, spills and incidents doesn't seem too bad to me at all. The only thing that slightly bugged me was the 125 and 250cc races. A great addition to the meeting, but which bright spark decided to stage all 3 125cc races on a trot at the start of the meeting, and then all 3 250cc races on a trot later in the evening? Surely mixing them up a bit would've been a better idea? Or maybe it's just me. Considering it rained for pretty much exactly an hour prior to the start of the meeting, I thought the track held up really well. It's a technical track, and if you add in an hour's worth of rain, it's usually a very messy combination! The first half a dozen heats were always going to be tricky but the track settled down well after that I thought. On this occasion, I don't think sawdust was necessary. Sawdust is not always ideal. It can make a track "clumpy" or so I've been told before. I tend to look at sawdust as a last resort. The biggest disappointment of the night was the food, which was truly horrendous. Congrats to Joe Haines. Great to see him up there again after the last few seasons he's had. Commisserations to Richie Worrall. I'd loved to seen him win it, but I guess it wasn't meant to be on this occassion.