Grachan

I was ok with the scoring system in the early rounds, then started to have doubts about it, but thought it worked ok again last night. The fact that Bartosz was having a slightly below par night in the heats made it a bit of a cliffhanger as to whether or not he would reach the final so it kept Tai and Freddie in the hunt. Then he proved himself in the money heats. Amazing that Freddie and Tai were level under both methods.

I don't get to many matches, but I'd definitely pay £12.99 for good coverage of several Swindon matches or maybe about a fiver for a single camera shot from the ref's box with no commentary if live. An evening's fish and chips cost more - or grotty burgers for 3 at the stadium. I think it's good value. Costs needs to be covered and it doesn't want to be so cheap as to discourage people actually going. I probably go to about 3 or 4 matches a season and that would stay about the same, or possibly increase as my interest would be higher.

I remember putting a video of a race featuring Tommy Johansson on YouTube a few years and got a message from his daughter thanking me and saying how he had loved seeing it.

Is it not possible that, if the limits are set so exactly, you might find that all the riders are moving to a degree before the tapes go up?

Good post. I think the best rider I ever saw was Michael Lee when he was on top form. I remember a Golden Helmet at Swindon - Phil Crump vs Michael Lee. Crump was almost unbeatable at Swindon. In the Golden Helmet races, Lee was pulling wheelies down the straights and still won by half a lap.

It was the 1971 World Pairs final. He scored 15 paid 18 - a paid maximum -to take the title along with Andrzej Wyglenda. That win included a Polish 5-1 over Mauger and Briggs - which would probably explain why Ivan said he saw Jerzy as a threat before the 1973 World final.

Tennis.

Well, you don't have to, but if they can't understand it then it might be helpful I guess. Heats are, technically, qualifiers by definition.

It's easy. Look up what the word "heats" means. When I was at school, heats were always qualifying races and at first, when taken to speedway as a kid, I couldn't work out why speedway races in matches were called "heats" as they weren't qualifying for anything. To check this wasn't just my own imagination, I googled the word "heat" : It means: "a preliminary round in a race or contest" So I looked up Preliminary and it means: "preceding or done in preparation for something fuller or more important". So there you go. If you need to explain it to a non-speedway fan tell them that.

The stadium looked less than half-full on Friday, which was the maximum capacity. Was the selling option, perhaps, one ticket for both nights and a lot of people bought a two-night ticket even though they were only going on Saturday?

I guess I'm just a three-quarters empty kind of guy.

I think the main problem with it was that it was in Amsterdam in a three-quarters empty stadium.

Didn't they once do just that. I remember Leigh Adams used to regularly refer to the final as the 'A' final in interviews long after they had changed it.

That had actually crossed my mind. Do 10, 8, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. I guess it might discourage the lower riders too much, though.

Fair play to Laguta. He had to fight for that one. The speed he has in that bike ridiculous though. It's like watching Muller in 83.

Laguta not so hot when he doesn't gate!

Just been said on tv that they had to pre-order all their tyres for this year's GP because of... da da daaaaa... Covid.

Homologated. The word of 2020.

Laguta and Janowski seemed to have so much extra speed in those heats. Can that really be down to a tyre?

I actually think the points are easier for non fans now. The heats are qualifiers. Simple. The same as heats in the olympic athletics. Qualifiers. The fastest athletes don't even extert themselves if they are safely through. Qualifiers. Semi finals. Final. Surely that is easier for the layman, who won't be filling out detailed scorecards and counting every point. I never follow the heat scores in detail in the GPs, so the final points were easier for me to follow.

So, does a last place beat an ef while leading?

How has that changed? The final block of races are just as significant to the semis now as they were last year. The main problem last night was that 7 riders were streets ahead of the others so most of the qualifiers were obvious after 4 races apiece.

A valid point regarding the race fixing, but the old points scoring was always open to the same thing in World Championship qualifiers. Penhall in 82 being a prime example. There is a lot of talk from people complaining that the heats are just qualifiers, but, in the days of one off finals, entire meetings were qualifiers. Nobody complained then. Also, in old World finals, you had 5 scoring heats to decide the winner. Here, you have 8 finals. I liked the old system better, but to me this isn't as bad as people are saying.

And, while they are at it, we don't want to watch the start from behind either.

I had reservations about the new scoring, but I thought it worked fine. The Lindgren situation added to the drama rather than take anything away. It may not work so well in the later rounds with two riders fighting for the title, but on the basis of this one I had less problem with it than I thought I would. I didn't think it really needed changing from last year, but for this entire topic to just be people complaining about it seems a bit excessive. I enjoyed the meeting. Not sure if Laguta can keep this up for the entire series, but a great start for him.