The Third Man

Obviously my age, what year is it???

I have been a big critic of the track this season, but credit where its due, the last three matches at least have been entertaining, so if this one is the same it could be good again

Can we go with a guest for Bates and rr for Howarth, that way we can have Graj, Kurtz, Berge and the guest for rr

Speedway comes across as a joke when someone gets double points full stop

And where was the outcry from the football league about it or the FA

They may become known to a wider audience, but i am afraid no one in football is bothered about little Torquay excet the supporters of Torquay, so dont expect any bad publicity about this matter

Same could be said of Frank Varey at Sheffield, the big difference being we weren't allowed to rum a 'B' team in the league

How about Frank Varey as well

Well that is definately in the hands of the BSPA, they can make that happen

The problem would be that you would have to pay wages for three away meetings from the gate receipts of one home meeting, I know the wages would be less but I am not sure they would be enough to cover the costs think W Germany did in the 70's, sure Les Glover used to ride over there

Why cant Shanes and JPB share the no 7 slot, both get experience and we have our own riders. or is that too sensible

Remember their battles against each other in Heat 13 at BV, usually with the Sheffield rider third,

He didn't just beat him, he beat him from the back at Hyde Road, just after we had won 40 - 38 I think in the cup, sure it was 1969 as well, but could have been 1970, still have the programme somewhere Arnie was a great rider, stuck to the inside line and passed people which was not easy to do at Sheffield , as above was non riding reserve in the 1969 world final and represented his country quite a few times in Britain and Australia I am sure he worked as a gardener for a council, could have been Halifax as well as riding, died a few years ago, remember his minutes silence at Sheffield

He looked good at Sheffield in the under 21 match last season, dont think its the track, think it is equipment

What ever is the rule on the day he wants to return will be put into place

Hi s problem to me at Sheffield at least was that he didn't seem to have to the power he needed. if he got to the third bend in a good position he usually scored points, but he didn't seem to have the power to gate consistently and to have power coming out the second bend to stop others passing him. hopefully he will be back soon and with some help to get a more competitive engine for Sheffield. it would be a big shame to lose him to the sport, and a big shame for Sheffield to lose him as a rider

He looked way down on power at Sheffield, hopefully comes back soon with a sponser to help get the best out of him

It will depend on whether JPB, Branford and Kurtz have some power this week, they seemed to be very slow last week

Well the beautiful sunny day bit is right anyway, not bad a 50% sucees rate, or a 50% failure rate depending on how you look at it

Hopefully the superior tigers will get a track they can race on and win the meeting Then we can have an entertaining night

To be honest I think they are a necessary evil, as I have stated they have been around for the 50 years I have going to speedway and I cant see another way of doing it. But how can a guest ride for both teams in a cup final as quoted above, and this season you could have a guest riding for one of their teams and against their other team in a relegation play off, now I cant wait for that farce to happen

But they didnt double up in the same was as today, there were no guests or rr if your rider was riding for their normal team. An out of form rider could only be replaced 6 times in a season if my memory if correct. Sheffield used their own riders who they had loaned out to BL2 teams or riders they signed on a short term basis to cover injured riders. they didn't us a different rider every week or use riders from the same league to cover injured reserves, and the riders used the experience to gain confidence to move up a league the next season on the whole

There have always been guests since I started going 50 years ago. However what was originally for a number 1 rider either injured or on international duty has now turned into an epidemic of guests for any reason. Also if each team had a guest or RR then they cancelled each other out and a number 8 came in, what happened to the number 8 (although now three teams could have the same number 8 I suppose) teams tried to make sure that they did not ride on a night where clashes occurred, now it doesn't seem to matter, just ride and have guests and or rr the one I cant get my head around is a guest for a rider who is riding for another team on the same night and having guests for a reserve when they are injured. same with rider replacement, used to be for an injured heat leader (by definition anyone of the top three in the averages) now again its for anyone except reserves, one of those is covered by a guest so isn't needed I want to pay to see seven man teams of riders affiliated to my team, again, what happened to a number 8 replacing a reserve, not a 6 man championship select team against another 6 man championship select team

Its at least a year that the track has been bad, with a few exceptions, so thats a lot of five week delivery times missed, how come scunthorpe get theirs and we dont?

Said the same at Sheffield last night, both teams basically had to chose two riders from three, Sheffield should have known their two after heat 13, peterboro maybe waiting for Starke in heat 14, but then two minutes after the end of the race should have done it