spanner47

I don't want to spoil it, but we're talking MK here. Do you think the locals will drive miles to find a field with limited facilities, to watch 3rd tier racing? They didn't want to watch decent racing at a great little track before, so why should they now? I loved the old track, you could stand next to the fence and look down on to the track, it was brilliant, but not brilliant enough to get the locals out of their front rooms. I've come up with some very valid points why this is not a great idea in the current speedway climate. Just very surprised you cant see the blinkin obvious, unless of course you think we've got three great leagues in this Country that need more tracks. Most of us "realists" can see the top and bottom divisions are currently poor, and the middle league is being dragged down because the top league is struggling.

We don't need to find obstacles, I'm sure any resident within 2 miles will find them. Regards The realist

Certainly not. How many guests are riding for Lakeside tonight? Doubt they'll be many GP riders here next year, all the fans are moaning about too many riders doubling up and not seeing the same team each week, as I said, too many tracks and nowhere near enough riders. When there's enough riders then open more tracks, until then, no thanks.

Not to mention Norwich, Exeter and somewhere else in Cornwall. We've already got too many tracks and not enough riders anyway.

That's a disgrace. A game of football I was at recently got abandoned after 52 minutes, all us away fans have been given free admission for the rearranged fixture. I can't believe a restaurant could possibly charge you for 3 courses if you only have 2, is there any other walk of life where you get ripped off like this? I always thought you get what you pay for, obviously the speedway crooks are a law unto themselves.

How much of a refund do the fans get when It's called off after 10 heats? Never happened at sunny Foxhall from memory.

Season over for the time being, go through the motions, stay fit, then let the important stuff begin.

One thing for sure, whoever gets the choice in the play offs wont pick us. Another good performance from 1-7. That pass from Cam in heat 14 was superb, amazing what a bit of confidence can do.

Depends on who's the ref. Mr Durno is certainly capable of getting 30 heats in, he managed 15 (including a few re runs) in under 70 minutes at Ipswich a few weeks ago when there was a threat of rain. But the cynic In me reckons the home promotion will be happy with the 2nd meeting being curtailed after 10 or 12 heats.

Has anybody got a clue what size crowd BV need to break even tonight?

Well done lads, and to think there was a couple of Witches fans calling for LL instead of Morten before the season started. As for Richie, I kept saying last season form is temporary, class is permanent about BB, I was wrong then, but hopefully this is just a blip for our No 1.

Testing the track 2/3 weeks ago would not have helped. Making sure the drains were clear 2/3 days ago would have. Sometimes the best bit about the GP's are the fireworks at the end. We've had a lovely day, interrupted by some average showers, and it all ended at 11-30 with an excellent firework display down by the river. Looking forward to coming back to see more of this lovely City, and hopefully some Speedway next time.

Spoke to the Referee at 11-00 this morning and he said no chance then. Only had a couple of showers since, had the track been fit, it would have still been on. Only spoke to one fan heading for Daugavpils, he reckons he can't get back by public transport until early Monday. From previous experience, I'd advise travelling by coach, It was quicker, more comfortable and cheaper when I made the trip a few years ago. But what a lovely place to spend a weekend, the whole of Riga is buzzing, loads to see and do and It's all free. If ever a meeting was going to get called off, I'm glad It's this one and they made an early decision. Looking forward to meeting up with some friends downtown this evening. I certainly wouldn't be so cheerful had this been Vojens or somewhere horrible like that.

Flying out tomorrow expecting the worse, I'm not usually pessimistic about new tracks but this one could be flat and boring, I sincerely hope I'm wrong (I usually am). A friend was at the track earlier, he said there was some concern that the first bend was a bit soft, so they were digging it up a bit. As for the winner, when It's a track no one has seen before, my money is always on Greg.

It's the rules that have allowed him to do it, same every season. The bloke is brilliant at what he does, and when the need arises he has the financial clout to do what he wants. Every other promoter could have done the same. I don't agree with boycotting away meetings as the decent promoters will suffer, but I've always said that the BSPA events should be boycotted until they listen to the fans. Let's face it, every year most of these meetings are beset with numerous problems. This season like no other the fans are (almost) united on many fronts, the cheap reserves, too much doubling up to name but two.

I had to look twice at that, it did say next meeting, not next week. Shame no meeting, but I'm sure we don't want to ride away on certain dates, just as teams don't want to come to us on certain dates. I never thought I'd read this on the forum, let alone write it, but I thought Eddie Kennett was really good last night, he must have changed his attitude as he's only got one job now. He'd have got rider of the night for me, had our Skipper not been on fire.

Shame no Mellgren, he usually goes well around our place. But at least it saves Uncle Len a few quid. Should us fans be short changed because another team wants to employ a Swede who cant ride on a Thursday? There isn't enough riders to go around, maybe a facility should be allowed in certain cases. As an Ipswich fan I'd rather see competitive action, not some junior struggling around at the back.

After last years fiasco I'm amazed so many went back this year, talk about gluttons for punishment. Until someone takes charge of these meetings that knows what they're doing, there's no way I'm going to bother.

Not sure if It's been mentioned, once the Poole thing came up I stopped reading the thread. Rob Lyon wanted a long term plan and was told "no chance", all the sky money has to go to the promoters to fill the bank accounts of foreign riders. But maybe Rosco has a chance, if the EL goes down to 8 clubs next year, that should leave some spare cash to support our youngsters and try something different. It may not work, but at least we'd have given it a go. It cant cost that much to send our kids out to Europe to have a couple of test matches, and some proper practice on bigger circuits. Come on BSPA, just for once look at the bigger picture, give it a go for a couple of years, nothing ventured and all that.

I hope the Melbourne GP comes off, flights are the cheapest they've been for a long time to get down there, mainly thanks to a certain airline having a bit of bad luck lately, cant complain at £720. 28th March would be ideal, then the Cricket World Cup Final at the MCG the day after, not that I'm greedy.

So that's two meetings at Plymouth and one at Somerset to sort out in the next few weeks. Will common sense prevail? I know with various other commitments It's difficult to sort out the perfect fixture list (in fact it must be impossible), but surely a double header at Plymouth would seem logical. I suppose as we're ahead with our fixtures, we go down the pecking order to get ours sorted, oh for an independent body to sort things out which is as fair as it can be to all, never gonna happen!!

Great performance, decent crowd, top notch meeting, best of the season. Well done to some of the Berwick lads, it takes two teams to produce racing as good as that. If someone had said 2-3 years ago you'd get better racing at Foxhall than over the border at compost corner, you'd have been sent to the funny farm. But from what I've seen lately, the racing is certainly better this side of the border, and long may it continue!!! Up the Witches!!!

Thanks for that, I'm amazed they're allowed to make changes to the riding order after practice, I assume the programme at the track must be left blank then. According to the SWC website tickets are available from £2, I assume that must be for kids.

As we're not allowed any discussion on the race card section, can the Gentlemen who do these cards double check everything. I printed off 2 different versions on Tuesday and they were both wrong!! I don't usually print those things off, but in the SWC It's always nice to predict where the Joker will be played.

As Fox was going to ride on Sunday, it seems there probably never was a problem with Richie riding. I think some of us got the wrong end of the stick as Rosco had stated "we're all" flying out as a squad on Wednesday. I assume as the other meetings have had practice in the morning, Richie doesn't have to be there until tomorrow in readiness for that. At least Richie is prepared to fly out there and do next to nothing just in case his Country needs him, very tempted to follow that up with a sarcastic comment about the Premier League's No1 rider, but I wont.