Ben91

Again, those things mean little. More experience and better backing doesn’t mean better on track. Just in the same way that one day things could just click for a very experienced rider who isn’t a top level performer and they could really kick on, look at Leon Madsen and Jason Doyle.

Over the last two decades I would venture (without doing too much research) that we’ve lost a lot more tracks than we’ve gained. Due to a variety of reasons, opening a track now is a lot harder than it was in the past. Noise concerns, lack of interest from fans, Speedway being a black hole for money being just three. Opening a new Speedway track ultimately is more trouble than it is worth. That isn’t cynicism, I wish it was. But it’s realism. Blind positivity helps nobody in the same way that criticising for criticism’s sake helps nobody. What is becoming ever more apparent on this forum recently to my mind is that more and more fans are growing disillusioned with the way the sport is run here. But change seems to be a long way away, or non-existent. Supporters are customers. They don’t owe the promoters a thing. It is the promoter’s job (and business) to get numbers through the turnstiles. If those numbers are dropping off then they aren’t doing their job properly. If a promoter can’t promote then why do they deserve for supporters to support them?

Age has no bearing on when a rider reaches their peak. Holder seems a different rider this year so far but whether he can keep it up remains to be seen. I think Lambert is the better rider now and has the higher ceiling potentially but he needs to get his starts sorted out to mix it on the GP stage. I half expect us to be on the cusp of a Zmarzlik era however, and for any other rider to get much change out of him could be tricky.

I wouldn’t be surprised if it isn’t held late despite having months to prepare for it.

Shouldn’t have taken those years away from the GP when he was arguably the best rider in the world.

Indeed. The connotations in the west have changed however since the Nazi party picked it up. I think the main issue here is more people getting offended on behalf of other people than anything else. Somerset made a smart business move because some people will be offended or complain about it because they need to have something to complain about. Whatever way you want to look at it they’ve saved themselves potential criticism and a headache.

The swastika was originally a religious symbol. Things can change.

It isn’t. In a few places there may be proactive promotions. Note that of the five teams you have listed three are relatively new promotional teams. The IOW have always had to make hay with holiday crowds too, although granted their new promotion are doing a great job undeniably and we need more promotions like theirs. I’d suggest you read Barry’s post again also and read what he is actually saying. Proactively promoting is all well and good. The product on track is an incredible one, that is why we all love the sport. But the way the sport is run overall it is tantamount to polishing a turd. People complaining about having to shuffle along a few steps on the terracing will be an issue as long as there’s terracing and isn’t anything to do with Speedway or old timers. It’s an inherent part of any sport where there is terracing or unreserved seating and people who like to watch from the same spot week in, week out.

As I’ve said elsewhere, a big issue here is that we insist on running the leagues to a higher standard than the riders that are available. If we cut cloth to measure people would complain that the product is being “watered down.” The other excuse is that there “aren’t enough riders.” There are enough riders, just not enough willing to ride here who are of the unrealistic standard British Speedway is trying to run at. Look at the top tier teams due to race this season. Realistically I would say there are five riders we would definitely lose from that league should we cut our cloth to measure. Ironically they’re five who don’t need to double down to make the sport pay, Doyle, Pedersen, Iversen, B. Kurtz and Kildemand. The main issue I guess is that landlords are still going to want the same rent from their tenants whether the sport is part time or not. However without so much money going out on wages it wouldn’t be an insurmountable hurdle. The die hards will attend whatever is served up. They’re pretty much all we have left in terms of boots on the ground in stadiums anyway, so to suggest a league of a more realistic standard wouldn’t work due to fan numbers is a lazy excuse. It wouldn’t be that hard to reset Speedway on a better path here but nobody is seemingly interested in doing so. To do so we need to take a step back, instead we keep trying to build a palace on the sand. But at least each Premiership track would have got to see Nicki Pedersen twice across the year eh.

Wouldn’t go near him with a barge pole usually. Over a few weeks however, and in good form, e/w I could be tempted. No value in Zmarzlik (5/2), Madsen (3/1) or Sayfutdinov (7/2) for me. Tai is at 8/1, I can see him raising his game for the GPs but again I don’t think anything under 10s is worth the punt. Stuck a quid on Tai at 100/1 the year he won his first world title. Definitely one of those “if only I’d stuck a tenner on” bets...

Bet 365 have Vaculik at 11/1 currently. Laguta at 14/1 is tempting too...

Had a little dabble on Holta over five. Worth the punt at 23/20. Edit: Six from three rides so far, wish I’d stuck more on now.

I think the confederate flag was also known as the rebel flag. The team may well have been named after local history but in the world of speedway there’s enough logic in using something called the rebel flag for a team nicknamed the Rebels I guess... the Somerset promotion made the right move ditching the flag a few years back definitely.

This makes sense. It was easy on the eye and to navigate, that is about the limit of my technical knowhow however mind you!

Newcastle had one of the better websites in the sport for quite a while. I guess costs may have played a part but it wasn’t broken so it’s a shame they tried to fix it.

Tutelage.

Pepe is having something of a renaissance this season. Be interesting to see how he fares if someone does pull out.

At Rye we had a decent Ace of Herts until 2004. Len usually used it to look at prospective signings for the following season and as a send off for the seven Rockets from that campaign. 2004’s was won by Stuart Robson and featured Danny King and Edward Kennett, all of whom has only raced in the Elite League that season so they were draws in a sense. All three ended up signing for us in 2005 when we won the Premier League too. Due to that successful 2005 campaign the Ace of Herts didn’t happen and I have a feeling that from 2006 onwards it went to being a 12 rider meeting. One year Andrew Silver was part of that 12 rider field and it seemed a bit of a publicity stunt, then he went and signed for us the following season and did really well for a year. That’s a tangent though!

I don’t think this is true. The issue I find is that individual meetings are no more than half-assed fixture fillers these days, in the same way that “B” league fixtures are. 12 rider individuals need to get in the bin and the individuals that are staged need to offer something to the fans or be meaningful in some way, be it riders championships or just showcasing riders at a track who may not usually race there. The sport cannot sustain being individual meetings only but there is a place for individual, pairs, fours meetings etc. alongside the team meetings.

Very interesting to see the replies are all in a similar ball park with regards to when things started to go wrong. It’s safe to say that we’ve been in a decline for almost 30 years then. That’s almost a third of the time Speedway has existed. I’ve always seen the World Cup as being a bit crap personally. Perhaps because we have never looked remotely like winning it while I’ve been a fan. It is interesting to note what Mike says above about us losing publicity when we stopped being a force internationally however. Has the ship sailed too far for us to ever become a force again unless by some minor miracle two or three exceptionally talented Brits come along and grace the same generation. It can’t be a coincidence that our best two riders (Woffinden and Lambert) currently cut their teeth in Australia and Germany respectively. Our representative in the GP challenge, Adam Ellis, did likewise in France I believe? It appears that we are beginning to show some promise with a few younger riders. But is that because they are better than what we’ve churned out before or is it because Denmark, Sweden and Australia aren’t turning out riders of the same standard they used to? Poland could have the monopoly on the sport completely soon enough. That could lead to the sport dying in a lot of other nations and then they’d be shooting themselves in the foot.

Out of interest, when do people think the decline in British Speedway started? My personal opinion is that for as long as I’ve been a fan (20 years), the sport has been on a downward trajectory. Would it be fair to suggest things started to go south after the last world final at Wembley in 1981?

Seems strange to me that Brennan has been seeded directly to the final, yet the British Under-19 champion, Kemp, has to qualify still...

He’ll be the bloke singing Hold The Line.

Could say he has never been the same since he won the world title. Was a two year spell where he was easily the best rider in the world (2016/17).

It was plain long before Adrian Smith came along that the sport needs an independent governing body to be honest.