keepturningleft

Give me a couple of days to sort it out

In his new book ‘Wembley and Beyond’, Briggo, recalls his appearance on Desert Island Discs. Barry correctly remembered choosing a song by Ella Fitzgerald, but not one by Elvis. Well, if Briggo is reading this, I can inform him that his exact choice of discs on the programme was as follows. Ravel’s Bolero And I Love Him(Her) Esther Philips You ‘Oughta Be In Pictures Ray Conniff & Billy Butterfield Manhattan Ella Fitzgerald In The Mood Glenn Miller Strangers In The Night Frank Sinatra Laura’s Theme Dr Zhivago Now Is The Hour ??? Islanders How do I know all this? Well, as a young speedway mad lad in 1967, I recorded the show onto our ‘state of the art’ Philips tape recorder with a microphone placed in front of our wireless. The recording has survived over the years as I have repeatedly transferred it onto whatever the latest new recording gizmo was at the time. If there is any interest, I could upload the recording onto YouTube, if my no longer young lad brain can work out how to do it.

I am puzzled by Jason Crumps' affable and positive attitude towards Ole Olsen. As Jason himself informed us last night, he is a racer not a rider, so why would he want to heap praise on the man who produces tracks that makes it impossible for him to do his job properly?

How long is a speedway meeting? Having witnessed yesterday’s PLRC at Sheffield, I would have to say exactly one hour too long. Let’s see, there were 22 races, and they would last say, 30 minutes. That leaves two and a half hours of staring at the advertising hoardings on the opposite side of the track – and there were only minor hold ups for a couple of accidents. I am 56 years old, not ancient, but at a stadium with no seating, even I am struggling to stand up for three hours non-stop. The time gap between the last race and the first semi-final was ludicrous and without any justification whatsoever. I didn’t time it but it felt like half an hour, and just when there appeared to be a chance of some action, we are then treated to the time wasting spectacle of the choosing of gate positions and riders indulging in the 100% pointless practice of ‘gardening’ by the gate. Choosing gate positions may be have some entertainment value on TV at the GP’s, but the vast majority of fans at Owlerton yesterday couldn’t see what was going on, so what was the point. Meetings such as this which are laboured and dragged out way beyond their natural length, only succeed in evaporating, and then killing stone dead the momentum and the excitement that should be a constant in any speedway meeting. There could, of course, be cynical reasons, god forbid. The longer people are there, the more they will spend at the bar etc. Hope I’m wrong on that one. In my view a sporting event should be done and dusted in two hours Meetings like this really need to be drastically tightened up with a two hour(ish) time limit imposed on them (barring hold ups caused by serious accidents of course). PS Well done Ricky Ashworth

Many riders from the past have said in interviews in magazines such as Backtrack, that they wished the GP system had been around in their day. The GP system is popular with riders and it's here to stay. The whole thing just needs an overhaul.

A packed out stadium. A great atmosphere. It looks impressive for any casual or new viewer dropping in. At Peterborough this Monday, there will be more people in the pits than the stands, and there will be no atmosphere whatsoever. That doesn't look good on television, even if the racing is good. Why do the miseries on this forum who complain about the GP's still keep watching them? And we all know that the people who say they won't watch another GP actually, secretly, will.

I can't think of anything worse than reading Backtrack, or any other mag, from a computer screen! I do fear however in common with other comments, that Backtrack may be close to having 'run it's course', with just about all the main players from the 70's and 80's having now been interviewed. Personally I would like to see lengthier coverage of the defunct track feature and expanded articles on individual meetings such as the world finals of the period.

Think it was Reg Fearman, who many years ago, was furious that two riders were fighting in the pits, and promptly ordered them to go out and fight in front of the main grandstand!

Superb full page(!) preview in Total TV Guide magazine as well as a second smaller preview on the day itself. Very positive advert for the sport. Well done that magazine!

Puzzled at the restraint riders appear to show regarding any criticism of the track on TV. At the end, Crump appeared to be diplomatic when you had the feeling that what he really wanted to say was 'the track is a pile of ****! Are the riders ordered to tow some kind of party line?

How about a feature on the celebrity connections with speedway in the 70's, as touched on with the interview with Stewpot in the recent edition.

'Rock n Roll' playing after every race, I can only assume the Poles have never heard of Gary Glitter

Ove Fundin used to say that the louder he was booed, the faster he would go!

There is only one Brit in Saturday's Motogp. The Brits just don't do winning at top level sport, including speedway!

Love the new format - hope you pick up many new readers. Just one thing...what am I to do with my spare VSM binder??

Wonder if the Chris Harris factor could add a few thousand on the gate this year??

I have just finished reading the book..totally riveting from start to finish. As a Halifax, then Bradford fan living in Huddersfield, all the events in the book are very close to home. It's the sort of story you couldn't make up. Congratulations to Tony MacDonald for producing this definitive and absorbing work on this talented but tragically flawed character. What a great film/drama this would make!

I don't doubt that the promoters have improved the main part of the Kings Lynn stadium, but what a horrible mess the centre area looks! What happened to the grass? The whole starting gate area looked like a big splodge of mud and looked most unappealing on TV.

Swampy passed away some years ago..he had heart problems but refused to have a by-pass.

There are worse things than Tony Millard. Sam Ermolenko, a legend as a rider and ambassador for speedway, a disaster as a commentator.

Just received the Cardif DVD. Overall it's tremendous value for a fiver, but the fake commentary spoils it completely. It's OK if you are not aware of an 'added on later' commentary, but when you are, and you have the original to compare it with, the whole thing is horribly phoney. If you have the Sky pictures, why not the commentary? I know it's only a fiver, but I do feel cheated and if I'd known, I wouldn't have bought it.

I believe that the World cup teams were racing for the Ove Fundin trophy. A shame then that the great man himself is hardly deemed worthy of a mention anywhere. This weeks Speedway Star fails to mention him, or the trophy that bears his name at all even though he is on the front cover. There was a brief glimpse and mention of him from Nigel Pearson on Sky's coverage, but how interesting it might have been for Sky or Speedway Star to have grabbed a quick interview with him so we could hear his take on the current speedway scene.

How many overtakes were there last night? Immpossible to keep track of them all. I've been watching speedway since 1965 and I don't think I've ever seen a meeting quite like it. A brilliant advert for the sport. The 'race off advantage' controversy would surely be solved by having it on a different track to the final. Well done to all the teams for 3 hours of fantastic entertainment.

....and if I see that bloody car advert with the balloons one more time....!!!

There's another curious connection with Peter Collins, Bomber and F1. When PC was at the peak of his powers in 1976, we also had a high profile British F1 champion in James Hunt.