lucifer sam

Easy when it was only 30 before. It''s a government test event.

Tickets on sale for British Under-19 championship: http://scunthorpe-speedway.com/ticketoffice

Well, we do seem to be entering all the Under-21 and Under-19 comps. It would be nice to see a few Under-21 test matches as well.

I think a lot of our talent is in the younger ages ranges. In four years time, the Danes and Poles might be bemoaning their inability to live with Jordan Palin, the Thompson Twins and Archie Freeman

GB doing so well in running some very good Danish and Polish sides close. I hope the Danes win it now, because it would be a shame if a joker decided the winner. I didn't think they had the joker in the Under-21 World Cup - it wasn't there when I saw a qualifier in Opole in 2012.

OTD September 2, 1973: Jerzy Szczakiel became Poland’s first World Champion, after defeating defending champion Ivan Mauger in a run-off for first place in Katowice. It was a huge shock to most people outside of Poland, although the Opole star was more than a match for anyone on Polish turf. Szczakiel was often unfairly branded the ‘Worst World Champion’ by British fans. He crashed out of the 1973 Daily Mirror International Tournament at Oxford, while he failed to score in the World Team Cup final at Wembley a fortnight after becoming World Champion while riding with an injury sustained practicing for the event. But he wasn’t a one-hit wonder. He scored a paid maximum for the triumphant Poles in the 1971 World Pairs Final in Rybnik, when he and Andrzej Wyglenda took a comprehensive victory and left the New Zealand pairing of Mauger and Barry Briggs trailing in their wake. Szczakiel won his opening three outings at Katowice, including a victory over Mauger in Heat 8 – a race in which the Kiwi only mustered a third. Russian Grigory Khlinovsky bundled the Pole wide in Heat 15, but he came behind to recover second place. He needed to win Heat 18 to clinch the title, but he finished second to Ole Olsen to join Mauger in the run-off for first place on 13 points. Polish ‘boy wonder’ Zenon Plech should have joined them in the run-off, but for some bizarre refereeing from West German Georg Traunspurger in Heat 19. Khlinovsky, also in with a chance of the run-off, knocked off Plech as they battled for the lead on the final lap. The referee stopped have stopped the race and excluded the Russian, but allowed it to finish, before booting out the Russian. Under FIM rules of the time, a re-run was not permitted, while first place had to be given to Peter Collins since he had completed the race and Plech had not. Maybe it’s just as well that Plech wasn’t in the run-off, since he had gained an extra point when Edward Jancarz let him through for victory in Heat 16 in a race stage-managed between four Polish riders. On the other hand, Szczakiel had won all his points fair and square. In the run-off, he took advantage of a typically ragged start from Traunspurger. Mauger closed in, but he misjudged his inside pass of the Pole on the third bend of the second lap and came crashing down. Szczakiel completed the remaining laps alone to thunderous noise from a crowd of over 100,000. Szczakiel become the first rider to defeat Mauger TWICE in the same World Final – a feat only John Louis would repeat. To his credit, Mauger was magnanimous in defeat and often praised Szczakiel. Research showed in the years between ’71 and ’73, the head-to-head between the two riders stood at a very close 7-6 to the Kiwi. Not many riders were able to go toe-to-toe with Mauger over this period. Szczakiel passed away yesterday at the age of 71. RIP Jerzy.

Yeah, we do have different perspectives of that weekend. For me, it was special, simply because it was my first foreign final, and of course, as you mention, we had Hans Nielsen to cheer on. The Saturday night meeting was definitely the better for racing, which was just as well, the way Hans was trapping that night. Even Mort gated in front of him. I think he had problem with his clutches, but still scored 12 points to keep himself in the mix. I do remember the Saturday night being a really cracking meeting. I think there was some decent races on the Sunday afternoon as well, although only John Cook gave Hans any kind of race. But, to also answer Grachan's point, the place wasn't heaving, but I already knew from Bradford 1985 that every final couldn't live up to Wembley 1981 (my first World Final) in terms of atmosphere. By the time we reached 1990, I realised how good a venue Bradford was for a World Final. But I think all the British fans were in a big cluster at Amsterdam and therefore there was a pretty good atmosphere in the stadium. The one that was really a damp squib (literally) was Vojens in 1988, where the bus took the wrong turning, got there less than a hour before the meeting and we ended up stood in a big puddle! Vojens wasn't fit for a World Final. Never gone back there again! And then you had Munich, which was a magnificent stadium, had the perfect result for us Oxford fans BUT it wasn't really racing was it? Amsterdam was my favourite of the foreign finals that I attended (there was also Gothenburg in 1991). It was great that it wasn't 20 heats and then bang, it was over. It's no coincidence, that when I started going to Assen, I continued going for a good few years. Again, you were getting two meetings rather than one (three if you included the international meeting on the Friday. featuring the best non-Grand Prix riders), and that's always an attraction to visiting fans. Maybe the two-day final should have been repeated somewhere like Gothenburg or Wroclaw and then fans would have got a real feel of how well it worked.

Never? Would it interesting to go back and check but I would say the winner did have the most points in at least two-thirds of cases. And every other motorsport offers points PER RACE. In F2, separate points are awarded for both the feature race and the sprint race. Likewise, British Touring cars awards championship points for each of the three races per round. A Speedway Grand Prix has 23 races and was awarding points for each of them, in line with other motorsports. It is now the outlier in not doing that. If you want to give the final greater emphasis, go back to 6-4-2-0 for the final. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. The worst thing the new points system will produce hasn't even happened yet. It's when riders, having already qualified for the semis, manipulate the results to stop their rivals from getting through and speedway is then accused of being corrupt. It's most likely to happen in the last couple of rounds.

FIM need to get tougher and make qualifying on Friday nights compulsory. Any rider failing to do so is banned - while no Federation is allowed to take sanctions against riders taking in an official practice. It's not like there aren't enough other Fridays in the season. If the Federation continues to offend, it receives a heavy fine and has sanctions taken against them - maybe that Federation has receives no wildcard nominations for five years. Stop the tail from wagging the dog.

It does make an awful lot of sense. I never understood all the negativity over the two-day 1987 World Final. It was the first time we'd travelled abroad for a final and loved that it was over two days rather than one, and we got to see 40 races instead of 20.

It was changed to the knockout formula in 1998, when they extended the series to 21-22 riders (plus 2-3 wildcards). It was also open to manipulation, with riders dropping points in the final outing to prevent another rider taking part in the A Final. That's what was good about the "every point counts" scoring system - it cut manipulation almost completely out.

The exact format and scoring for 1996 and 1997.

The problem is us anoraks will quickly adapt to the scoring system - e.g. it wasn't that hard for me to work out the points last night, as much as I think the new system is daft. It's the more general fans which won't understand the new points system e.g. how a rider can score 6 points in his races and yet end up with 8 Grand Prix points. It's really weird, having two different sets of points, and throws speedway out of kilter from almost every other motorsport where points are scored per race.

Remind me, is it OneSport taking over? If so, the European Championship has retained the "every point counts" system.

Yup, plus the pressure of winning the final and therefore the Grand Prix and standing at top of that podium at the end of the night. If Bellamy thinks riders are happy to sit back in second place in the final, he needs to go back and watch some of the finals from the last few years. When the Managing Director of BSI is so out of touch with the fan base, maybe a change is required.

F1 has 1 race per event, F2 has 2 races per event, British Touring Cars has 3 races per event, a Speedway Grand Prix has 23 races per event. Each used to award points per race - speedway is now the odd one out.

On the contrary, in F2, points are awarded in EACH race - in the feature race on the Saturday and the sprint race on Sunday. In the British Touring Car series, if there's three races, points are awarded for each of them. Same in virtually every motorsport discipline - points are awarded in every race. Speedway has now gone out on a limb.

OK, two examples: Laguta has 14 points entering the semi-finals. His reward for taking a further two wins is another 6 points. Lindgren has 7 points entering the semi-finals. His reward for a second and a third is another 9 points. That's nuts! If it ain't broke, don't fix it with a sledgehammer!

Hmm, yes. Another reason it's not a good idea.

All four gates are winning races.

Laguta might as well not come out in his next two and save the engine for the semis! Point scoring system is utter cr*p.

Spot on

It's all inclusive. Most National League tracks charge £14, plus a couple of quid for the programme. The price is for admission, programme and parking. At how many tracks could you do all of those for £15.50? It's 19 heats and nine riders per team.

Outright seventh for Jordan, then. Might have to amend the Scunny site, although I'd already used a little artistic licence in placing him ahead of the other riders on seven points and ignored any heat wins, etc

So does that count even if the referee got them the wrong way around?