stevehone

obviously i knew the answer, but having guessed the caps correctly, i thought someone else should get in there this time.

Lance King then....

every race counted to most of the riders.... especially N Pedersen as he could intentionally lose a race so he avoided the better riders later on :evil: a big problem in this format is knowing who you will meet in your next race up front... Jason Crump just went out to win each race, where Pedersen knew he had to get in weaker races. if the format is the 16 rider, 20 heats, there is no coming 4th rather than 3rd just to avoid so-and-so as your rides are programmed and you need to get as many points as possible to get to the respective finals.

but there are people saying that Pedersen isn't the best rider in the world yet he won a GP series... so maybe there is the 'Jerzy Szczakiel Syndrome' available still even in the current format. my biggest problem with the current GP format is the gate positions. when you ride a 2nd half race, there is a box with 4 coloured balls (sorry if that got Peter excited) that gets a shake and drop into the gate positions... primitive but fair.

so how good were you then and was Jacob better than you at speedway?

Jacob is Denmark team manager and is there looking after the Danish riders... NP is the higher profile of the Danes so you see J Olsen with him all the time. How often do the GP cameras follow Bjarne Pedersen around the pits to see if J Olsen is with him??? never. i do agree with what you say about the setup of the tracks... Olsen is going to look after their interests in some form i'm sure.

at the end of the day, Pedersen won it.... we need to accept it. hopefully having someone like him as Champ will give the sport a bit more publicity... you know you don't always have Mr NiceGuy at the top of the tree for anything, and Pedersen might just surprise us all with what he could do for the sport. If you watched the play-off final with Tim Lovejoy and Helen Chamberlain presenting the trophies, they said there hadn't been any crashes yet... it was what they were after....they didn't know good racing from bad. If there had been a crash, it would be shown on their extremely popular allsport show on a Friday night. All this is exposure... it's what the sport needs in one form or another, and if Pedersen brings this in... fair play. But as you suggest, let's just hope no-one gets hurt in the process.

i got one of those blue Justice Brothers jackets too from Ivan but i think i draw the line at that red jumper....

maybe you've been doing a bit too much of that lately.....

is #60 Kenny Carter? or it could be Ivan Mauger

well i got the hat so just thought i'd leave the umbrella to someone else...

Sean Wilson

Andy Smith

#39 looks American... Kelly Moran?

add your comments to this..... http://www.speedway-forum.co.uk/forum/view...opic.php?t=4795

when watching a GP at home i turn the volume up loud (i have my tv running through my hi-fi speakers), so you try and get what is going on inside the stadium... with Hamar it sounded like you were at a swimming match or something like that...pretty non-descript really. when i turn the sound up for Cardiff or Bydgoszc, you know there is a big meeting happening. agreed BSI didn't know it would go to the last meeting, but there is a very good chance this would happen, or there would be so much at stake all round, so maybe somewhere other than Norway. saying all that though, Norway is supposed to be a nice place to go and visit but maybe not the final round of GP

or just make sure the last one is on a permanent track... something the riders can have a little more confidence in when so much is at stake. i'm sure john posselwhatever wants to have the best stadia for the GPs but one that only holds 9000 for a deciding meeting, and in a country of only 1 or 2 decent riders, you are maybe asking for trouble. if Saturday's meeting was at Cardiff it would have had more than the 40odd thousand that were there in June, or Bydgoszc... what sort of atmospere would have been there? make Hamar one of the early or mid term GPs, but make sure you have something special for the finale of the series.

watching the GP on tv Saturday evening..... i was looking forward to it as the world championship was being decided, but did anyone get the feeling of it being a let down? (apart from the result as you would have had your favourites) as a neutral speedway fan, i just felt there seemed to be no atmosphere but with a totally strange noise due to it being indoor. it just seemed very flat. as the final GP there should have been more excitement and to be in a stadium that only holds 9000 but was nowhere near full was a little worrying. bear in mind it is the same next year.

don't do it again.... i'll be watching :evil:

it wasn't you i was talking about Shazz....

i'm suprised to see not many people have posted on this thread :? i think Hancock went about his business very professionally in the GP and secured the win when it mattered. well done Hancock.

the rider with the most points won it. nuff said really

i just felt the ref had actually been consistent all evening but then threw it away in the final. as leg trailer pointed out, the title was won, and fair play to Pedersen, but just to keep the continuety Pedersen should have gone.

thought so

if you want to know how many times i rode at Plough Lane i couldn't tell you... i was born in Wimbledon and when i started riding i would nip round in my lunch break to see Cyril Maidment to ask if i could have a couple of laps after the meeting. normally run out of time so it wasn't very often but enjoyed riding against Wimbledon. always seemed to be extra pressure on me as i was a supporters club member for years before and knew all the first bend loonies. my happiest times were at Canterbury beating Wimbledon riders like Jay Pleece, Mark Fordham, Phil Vance etc People on here have slated my riding but the first time i sat on a bike was when i was 17... never did grasstrack as most of the riders i was up against had been doing since they were kids