Paulco

Yup , you don't leave the pub until the pre-meeting bollocks is completely finished and it's safe to take your seat .

I can remember paying 55p to get into Coatbridge in the mid-seventies . But before that my dad paid or he lifted me over the turnstile ( which was the norm at speedway and football in those days ) .

I worry though how badly our Premier League will be affected if the under 21s becomes a GP type event . Too many riders could be posted missing at crucial times of the season if this happens . The international demands are bad enough without increasing it .

It's all to do with track preparation i would imagine . I've seen Leszno on the telly and there seems umpteen racing lines , likewise Bydgoszcz is universally accepted as the most entertaining GP normally . Then you see some EL tracks and they're as bald as a coot .

One for my Monarchs pals . I remember in the dim and distant past - well the early seventies anyway . Was there not a track at Newtongrange ? Whatever happened to it ?

With the dearth of British talent at the moment , it's not completely out of the question that young Mr Barker might be riding as a wild card .

That's the good part about this . Those hotels who keep jacking up the price year after year can now go swivel .

You forgot Glasgow dear .

You're never going to please everybody Sue . We always turn it into a weekend anyway to take in the Pairs and a meeting on the way home on the Sunday .

While 1993 and 1994 were indeed two special seasons in the history of Glasgow speedway , back to back league and KO Cup doubles , my favourite season was 1991 . Watching a young Jason Lyons and Shane Bowes emerge as riders was very enjoyable and that season culminated in taking probably the best team ever to ride at 2nd division level , the 1991 Arena Essex Hammers , to a replay in the KO Cup Final . That season paved the way for what was to follow a couple of seasons later .

Think it's great . Trying to kill time on the Saturday , whilst trying to stay out the pubs , aint easy . Gives us plenty of time for a good night after the event .

When Ian Hoskins paid a visit to Glasgow this season past , he was waxing lyrical , while being interviewed on the centre-green , about the immediate post-war Ashfield and in particular Ken Le Breton . I'd heard so much about him from my father and i would have loved to have seen him ride . Actually i recently saw a couple of photographs from Ashfield in that era , and you couldn't have shoe-horned any more people onto the terraces - it was packed . Oh how times change .

I started going to speedway in the last year Glasgow were at the White City . And as i was only nine , my memories are few and faded . I would love to have been old enough to appreciate Glasgow Tigers / Edinburgh Monarchs derbies when they rode out of the White City and Old Meadowbank respectively , and both sides were in the top flight . A place i never made it to was Odsal , would have loved to have seen a league meeting there . And having loved the Coatbridge circuit , i would have enjoyed " The Shay " when Eric Boocock was in his pomp . I'm afraid Halifax was another one i missed out on .

Nicholls is by far the best rider we have at present , but is a bit of an enigma . There are times when he looks more than capable of living with the likes Nicki Pedersen and Jason Crump , but unfortunately he can't sustain it and reverts back to mediocrity all too often . Harris , apart from that freak night at Cardiff , has looked hopelessly out of his depth in GP's and how he has obtained a wildcard for next year is beyond me . I would like to see both of them do well , but i'm afraid you can only see them languishing down in about 10th and 11th places or thereabouts once again .

Agree totally . The GP series is how we find our World Champion , how is this possible when a certain amount of riders are only selected through a quirk of birth . If we must go down the GP route then let's get a better method of qualification sorted out .

Arrange to have a weekend free at the end of June and you can join me in the annual Cardiff pub crawl .

I had a Jim McMillan one and a Charlie Monk one when i was a wean Although Charlie's photograph , whether on the front of the programme or on the rossette , would scare the weans .

Got soaked through coming up the road from work earlier . Too cold , too wet and too dark to be stood on that 1st bend tonight mate .

To be fair mate , Dick was entertaining back then . I suppose in 1978 his patter was fresh then , still using the same stuff at Berwick 30 years on . Back then , when Dick was centre-green announcer at Blantyre One , both ourselves and the Monarchs raced on a Friday night . The Monarchs home meetings were covered live by Radio Forth , and Dick used to take great delight in keeping us up to date - if the Monarchs were losing .

Going to the Friday night meeting at Blantyre One , and then getting on the supporters coach and travelling overnight to places like Canterbury . They were great times .

Before the days of teletext and t'internet i had to go into the kitchen at 11 p.m. and tune into Radio Luxembourg to get the night's speedway results , which they gave after the news .

My favourite Tigers track - Coatbridge . The place was a right dump - bits falling of the roof of the shed on the back straight , pee flowing out the bog door under the stand . But what a track . The Northern Riders Championship qualifiers . Probably the reason i'm still not keen on individual meetings - they were awful meetings . Not continually looking at the sky for rain - in the seventies it seemed so much dryer . Speedway on a Friday night . Glasgow were always a Friday night club - none of this Sunday afternoon bollocks then .

Would it though . I go to Cardiff every year and Nicholls and Harris are way down the list of the riders i want to see . Do Swindon fans support Nicholls over Adams at Cardiff , do Lakeside fans cheer Harris against Jonsson , do BV fans prefer to see Crump lose to Nicholls . I think not . There will be a wildcard for the patriotic fans , while the rest of us will enjoy the GP - British riders in the field or not .

Agreed Sajfutdinov and Holder will bring something young , new and exciting to a tired looking series . Time to jetteson the dead wood like Nicholls , Bjarne Pedersen , Harris and Dryml .

They will have a wildcard to cheer , presumably Scotty . Don't really get this " there must be a Brit in it " argument myself . If there isn't a Brit good enough then such is life . Why didn't Nicholls , and Harris for that matter , not give themself every chance by doing the qualifiers ?