keepturningleft

Fantastic stuff on big, wide, fast proper speedway tracks. Amazing ariel shots - the first time I've seen a firework display from above looking down!

As a casual dropper inner to these forums, can someone please tell me who the heck Puk is??

Don't know why Greg Hancock gets so much stick on this forum because when a GH race is coming up, this is the ideal time to put the kettle on secure in the knowledge that you won't be missing any excitement. You can return to your front room just in time to hear Kelv and Nige exclaiming, 'What can you say about this man!!' as Greg does his lap of honour having gated and won the race by the country mile for about the 765th yawn inducing time. Yes, he is a master craftsman - but only at gating. A couple of weeks ago (in the world cup?), Greg overtook a rider to win a race. I can honestly say this the first time I can recall, out the hundreds of races I must have seen with Greg, that I have witnessed this very rare event.

Can't believe anyone has even started this topic. Don't fix something that isn't broken. The points system should be as simple as possible and the current arrangement is as good as it can get. Remember when we had the 'super 8's' and other ridiculously complicated procedures. Dead heats should be acknowledged and decided by a coin toss. That's a lottery, but major football matches are often decided by the penalty shoot out which is more or less a lottery as well.

Bang on

sadly, we live in a time where wall to wall commentary seems to be obligatory. god forbid we should have a few seconds of silence occasionally.

I suppose todays commentators are faced with a situation unique to them, and that is that they are commentating every single week, sometimes twice a week and for 3 hours at a time. In the 70's Dave Lanning was on maybe once every three weeks or so and nothing was live in those days - edited highlights only. However, a quick glance at the synonym list shows that Kelvin has a choice of many words he could use as an alternative to his hugely excessive over use of 'terrific'.

Nothing new about low crowd at these events. Even back in the boom time-ish 80's, White City was empty one year when the home nation were not in action in a world cup qualifier.

Except you can see it on the Sky website

Owlerton is a terrifyingly fast track given how narrow it is.

Amazing that no-one spotted the cone on the track. Whatever happened to nicely appointed centre greens? The place looked drab and industrial with that vast expanse of greyness in the middle.

A rick star? that's a new one!

Think Jason Crump is the best pundit yet - sign him up Sky/Eurosport! Anyone noticed how showing respect for the national anthem now seems to be a thing of the past. Very surprisingly and disapointingly, Greg Hancock chose to hold a conversation with DW whilst his national anthem was being played.

I also met Reg Fearman and bought his book. I don't know about or really care about any indiscretions during his career, I only know that Reg brought speedway to Halifax in 1965 and promoted it brilliantly well for many years. This is where I saw my first meeting and became hooked on speedway, and for that I will be eternally grateful to Reg Fearman. Could this be the first time ever at Cardiff - no tape breaks, no restarts for any reason etc??

Greg Hancock is the nearest equivilant of todays riders to Ivan Mauger. Like Ivan, Greg is a gate and go, 'safe' rider who won't take many risks, and like Ivan this is why he has avoided any significant injury during his long career. Jason Crump virtually said exactly this during the pre meet talk on Eurosport. No-one wants to see riders getting hurt, but it's the Wards, Lorams, Collins and Gollobs we need. No-ones DVD shelf is ever going to strain under the weight of 'Greg Hancock's Most Thrilling Rides". I have a quite large video archive of 70's speedway with hundreds of races featuring Ivan Mauger. I cannot bring to mind a single, solitary race amongst that archive where Ivan actually overtakes anyone. Superslick, professional master craftsmen at work or 'fly by the seat of your pants' thrill merchants? No contest.

I was obviously so excited by the evening that I couldn't drive my car properly afterwards. The police pulled me over on the M50 and breathalysized me for erratic driving!! The Cardiff event has now evolved into something truly special. When you think that this very same event was held years ago at Odsal, a fairly ramshackle stadium and with little in the way of presentation. Compare that with what we've got now at the Millennium Stadium. It's the duty of every speedway fan to drag a speedway virgin to Cardiff next year. Those people may not become regulars but at least they will know what speedway is and just what a fantastic showpiece event we've got - how could anyone not be impressed by Cardiff? PS I hadn't been drinking and the cops let me off with a mild slap on the wrist! PPS Great track at Odsal 'though!

How many more years must we endure the sight of Greg Hancock thrusting that awful green drink at the camera and then worse, pretending to actually drink the stuff. Please Greg, retire now, you've had a incredible run but speedway needs 'the young'.

Let's be honest - controversy and punch ups are box office. Thank goodness for Nicki Pedersen. If all riders were like Greg Hancock, the terraces would be empty and speedway would be finished.

The last two GP finals have both produced unbelievable races. I have attended world finals going back to the 60's and can't remember such a standard of breathtaking action as we are seeing in many GP's nowadays.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zykyrxhJaL4 Check these out - although we've seen these clips before, these new postings are presented with the best picture quality I've ever seen. Check out all the associated clips - priceless!!

good heavens! - I've heard speedway mentioned twice today on television, on The Chase and A Question Of Sport. What's going on?

I am a huge Beatles fan who has a copy of all the books written on them by Mark Lewisohn. I am therefore thunderstruck to discover that this god of Beatle tomes is also a speedway fan and that two of my biggest passions are linked in this unexpected way! Now, if we could get ML to write a book about speedway! Actually, a series on celebrity fans be wondrous. Fantastic stuff Backtrack - and also a great new edition of Classic Speedway to boot!

Interestingly there are some similarities between speedway and speed skating.

Like Ivan Mauger in'77

Horrendeous