keepturningleft

Was the tractor on the centre green still impeding the view?

Reflecting on this now having absorbed all the tributes and comments, it's clear that speedway, in the modern age, has lost its greatest ever promoter. I can't recall such an outpouring of grief and admiration for someone involved in speedway who wasn't a rider. Nigel spent years promoting nothing but positivity in so many aspects of speedway that his contributions were quite extraordinary and surely without precedent. Crikey, he even ghost wrote Kelvin's recent book(s)! This really is a case of you don't know what you've got until its gone. A truly tragic loss.

Let's also spare a thought for Kelvin Tatum who must be absolutely devastated. His commentating career, as it was with Nigel, is obviously now over. Despite his involvement in many other sports, I am convinced that speedway was always Nige's strongest passion above all else. Does anyone agree?

Can hardly believe this. Awful,awful news.

What was the approx attendance?

.....pardon?

There was a feature last night on ITV's local news programme about the start of the new season at Sheffield. It's sad that any feature on speedway now all seem to start from the the default position that no-one watching has ever heard of the sport - you know the drill - cue rock music with quick fire editing of riders flying around the track and then the wholly predictable 'these bikes have no brakes and can accelerate faster than.......' well, you know the rest.

Unbelievable stuff from Dan Bewley here!

I think non commentary during the race and then analysis and chat for the replays and all the rest would be the perfect compromise - like the tennis. But that's not going to happen. To be fair to Nigel, he does occasionally allude to the fact that the meeting probably isn't the most exciting thing in the world if we've seen a run of processional races.

When a race is in progress, you have to question if you need commentary at all - we can all see what's happening and after all we don't need commentary whilst watching live in the stadium. The most annoying commentary of all at the Olympics is for ice skating. Ice skating isn't really a sport, it's performance art, the same as dancing and is often an elegant and graceful spectacle which is ruined by intrusive commentary, and you can't mute that because you need to hear the music.

If anyone is watching the Winter Olympics you may find yourself never complaining about Nige or Kelv again. Even curling, yes curling has suffered from commentators seeing fit to shout and scream in states of near hysteria. It seems as if we are not allowed to watch anything without commentators filling every second of time with incessant, technical babbling most of which is of no interest to anyone.

Re noise - there are houses close by, and all the length of the back straight at Belle Vue. I can only assume the acoustic barrier does its job as everything seems harmonious.

Why is it not possible to buy a copy of Speedway Star at the NSS? Do other tracks sell the mag?

More amazing racing from the NSS but I think six man races are a huge mistake. Given the high speeds of the NSS, the potential for serious carnage is not acceptable, bearing in mind we saw two dreadful accidents just seven days previously. I thought the idea of six man races had been put to bed years ago and in fact wasn't it Mark Loram for one, who refused to take part in them. Also, it's nigh on impossible to keep track of who's who in a six man race. Ironically, one of the last meetings at Hyde Road, the Ivan Mauger farewell, used 6 man races at the instigation of Ivan himself I believe. It was deemed not succesful at the time. 4 riders is the tradition - please stop fixing things that aren't broken. Agree with the above poster about the music especially given the average age of the crowd. Ok we don't expect Yellow River by Christie but it can't be hard to find a compromise. Enough of the negatives, the NSS is a phenomenal race track and we are so lucky to have it!

Briggo at Belle Vue, Manchester, on a Saturday night in October! Fans of a certain vintage will be aware of the significance of this!

Someone once said that Forum sites were where the miseries the world meet up. He was right. I was in the south stand and thought the whole spectacle was brilliant apart from the crashes. Zmarlik alone justifies the entrance fee. What a rider. Just what do people expect? Here's a challenge to everyone who thought that meeting was poor. Go on Youtube and find a meeting from the 70's, 80's, or 90's where there is multiple passing in every race and then post it on this forum. You will search in vain. This and and premiership plays off's have been represented the best of modern speedway as a spectacle. I've been watching speedway since the 60's and I'm not sure I've seen anything much better than these last three tv meetings.

Is the dads army music ever played over the tannoy?

Agree, on board cameras are a disaster. At Belle Vue in one race, we missed an overtake because of those damn things. Eurosport, please get rid of them.

MCN Days, Speedway Nights: A Reporter's Recollection of his Glory Days of Speedway Available on Amazon.

I have just started reading the new book from journalist Andrew Edwards. In it, Peter Collins opens up about his ongoing boycott of Belle Vue and the recent promotions. All this is such a shame - it's difficult to comprehend why after all this time, PC can't find it in himself to bury the hatchet and get back to Belle Vue where he belongs. PC must be nudging 70 by now and life is just too short to be consumed by bitterness. PC, if by any chance you get to see this post, the thousands of fans are surely more important than the few individuals with whom you have a grievance. You are Belle Vue's greatest living legend and would be guaranteed an overwhelming reception at the NSS.

Tremendous stuff on one of the best tracks in the world. I did have a moment of despair at the start however when I heard the dreaded words, 'on board camera'. Really annoying and at least one overtaking manoeuvre was missed by this waste of time viewpoint.

Screwdriver?? I thought it was a dirtometer.

Speedway is a sport with 'downtime', like cricket, cycling etc and therefore there is going to be a fair amount of 'non-action' time to fill. Imo the job of the commentary team is to provide a conversation you can be drawn into, like pulling up a seat at the pub. A mix of sporting chat and general chitchat works well and I reckon Nige and Kelv do a good job of it. Spot on. You don't get commentary whilst watching live in the stadium, so if you don't like the commentary, simply turn the sound off. There, solved.

Artem reminds me of a modern day Ivan Mauger. Fairly conventional, mainly smooth and unspectacular riding style and a mega gater.

Just been a preview/feature on local news programme Calendar, but bizarrely no mention of cancellation.