uk_martin

BSI are a business. To them what matters is who puts bums on seats. Their decision was that Harris's inclusion was best for business. And lets face it how many would Bridger or Kennett have put on the gate? The deal was done as far back as last November, a fact only disguised by the BSPA remaining silent about the issue and feigning relevance and credibility to the British Championships.

Lewis Bridger Tai Woffinden and Ben Barker in the same pits together. This will be as much a test of rider professionalism and man management skills as it will of the riders ability on the track.

Middledick supported Ward after his criminal prosecution in Australia. Ward is now supporting Middledick after his criminal team selections. What else would you expect?

What do you know of his reasons that you find disagreeable?

The Wolves connection has been noted!

:blink: No such thing as a very winnable trip to the top trump of trick tracks.

Not a bad meeting, all in all...can't grumble!

The thinking currently is that all team in the UK should have their web sites URL follow a formula i.e. teamnameinfull.co So:- birminghambrummies.co coventrybees.co lakesidehammers.co etc. ".co" is a Columbian domain suffix, just to add confusion, however it was one where every team could follow the pattern. No more variation with ".co.uk" or ".com" or ".net" or ".biz" etc etc www.speedwaygb.co (the BSPA site) follows this pattern, but the SCB (http://www.scbgb.co.uk/) don't lol

Maybe we should use the Polish rule that they use today...when 6 points behind,any rider can be brought in as a tactical substitute...oh wait a minute...haven't we seen that before somewhere? Anyway...ANOTHER proposal IF SkySports coverage is to end, then how about getting rid of that stupid rule that says that team race suits have to be black below the waistline? The EL, to satisfy Sky, are the only league anywhere to adopt this rule, and even the race suit designers are trying to get away from it with clever coloured embellishments. Scrap the rule entirely I say!

Maybe reverse psychology is needed then. Charge NEW fans £20 for their first two visits, and then they'll think that the standard £16 is cheap in comparison and will faithfully come ever after....perhaps!

http://www.birminghambrummies.co/see-the-brummies-for-a-tenner/

Spot on! Kyle Howarth showed a load of inexperience in the u-21's in Pila, not having his bike set up properly and looking a right berk as a result. International competition like this might prevent that sort of thing from happening again...mind you, you can see where the BSPA are coming from can't you? Show these young lads how green the grass is on the other side of the English Channel, and if they are good enough, you might never see them in British speedway again. http://www.speedwaygb.co/news.php?extend.21220

1. It was also live on television and live on radio...which by speedway logic is a good reason for crowds to stay away. 2. Bloomin' big money. 3 or 4 of these athletics meetings can pay for a speedway season ticket...and they say we have to tighten our belts and that people don't have money any more... 3. There's enough for someone to go to one every 2 weeks somewhere in the country...the same frequency as an EL home schedule. 4. Rugby Union also relies on regular crowds...now lets look at rugby ticket prices...http://www.leicestertigers.com/tickets/information.php - Any Leicester speedway fans like to compare prices between the Tigers and the Lions? Again, an example of a sport that is well supported proving that there is money in them pockets...and that Rugby has found out how to extract that money (check out Leicester Tigers's attendances) and speedway has not.

Kind of got me thinking, and gave me an excuse to air one of my thoughts... NO FACILITIES for teams where a rider is absent, due to justifiably withholding their services. So what does that mean? Well, imagine a club not paying a rider, and that rider not riding for that team again until his debts are paid. Why should a club get to benefit from a guest or rider replacement for running up bad debts? Why shouldn't a rider be able to say, without getting suspended for it, "if you're not paying me, I'm not travelling across Europe to attend your meeting at my own cost"? That's just one example of where a rider has a justifiable reason. There may be others too. Seems that the teams are in a no-lose situation and can treat their riders the way no other employers can treat their staff in any other line of business. How to administer this rule will need to be thought out, as relying on the mutual back-scratching society isn't the answer. Perhaps some kind of notice with supporting evidence lodged with the FIM or parent governing body? Or something...???

As the SGP was on the same day, obviously not...but still, some countries made an effort, and others didn't. Smoli and Wolbert could only beat what was out there. Well done to them for being there and doing the business.

Congratulations to Brummie, Martin Smolinski and former Brummie Kevin Wolbert on winning the 2013 European Pairs championships for Germany, yesterday at Herxheim. Not the greatest of line ups with the SGP being on the same day, but you can only beat what's put in front of you. YET AGAIN, another international event that the BSPA deemed fit to not bother entering. British Speedway is rapidly becoming as isolationist as North Korea is on the world political stage. We now only enter one international tournament, at senior level and I've heard that there are some in the BSPA that don't think we should be in the SWC either. Full results: Germany = 26 WINNERS 1. Martin Smolinski - 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 2 = 16 2. Kevin Wolbert - 2, 2, 1, 1, 1, 3 = 10 Poland = 23 SECOND 7. Sebastian Ulamek - 1, 3, 3, 3, 1, 3 = 14 8. Norbert Kosciuch - 2, 2, 2, 2, 0, 1 = 9 Ukraine = 20 THIRD 5. Andriej Karpov - 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3 = 18 6. Aleksandr Loktaev - 0, F = 0 R. Stanislaw Mielniczuk - 0, 0, 1, 1 = 2 Latvia = 20 11. Maksim Bogdanovs - 3, 2, 2, 1, 3, 0 = 11 12. Kjastas Puodzuks - 0, 3, 0, 2, 2, 2 = 9 Denmark = 13 13. Rasmus Jensen - 1, 1, 3, X, 2, 3 = 10 14. Kenni Nissen - 0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 1 = 3 Czech Republic = 12 9. Zdenek Simota - 1, 0, 2, 2, 0, 2 = 7 10. Josef Franc - 2 = 2 R. Zdenek Holub - 1, 0, 0, 2, FX = 3 Slovenia = 11 3. Matic Voldrih - 0, EF, 1, 1, 1, 2 = 5 4. Aleksandr Conda - 1, 2, 0, 3, 0, 0 = 6

Interesting seeing Perry Barr crammed today with people going to see grown men and women running round in circles around Perry Barr's "other" stadium...Also interesting is the pricing of the tickets. I've not been able to find out what today's prices were but here's some prices for upcoming events. Seems that there are those who think that there IS brass in pockets, and they also seem to be getting attendances that prove that they are right, http://www.bigticketshop.co.uk/sports/british-athletics-tickets.html?lid=british-athletics-1&gclid=COyi06SMjLgCFUfLtAodEVcAQw

Am I right in thinking that so far Andersen has only ridden in 8 of the 13 league fixtures so far this year? He'll be missing at Kings Lynn, then banned from 2 home meetings...so pretty soon that will read 8 from 16. Is anyone happy at having a #1 who is only present for half of the time with no commitment to any of the rest of the season? OR is it a good tactic to have someone missing so often that track specialist guests to be hired to suit the circumstances and the away tracks being visited? IMHO, Swindon need to sack him and replace him with someone who can fulfil their fixtures and if they don't do it voluntarily, then it's time that the BSPA withdrew their facility after the two meeting ban in order to force the issue, to be fair to the rest of the league.

In a country where average earnings is £600-£800 per month, and where a pint of beer down the pub is £1, you need to do some relative comparisons to see that to a Pole, speedway is no less expensive than it is to us Brits.

Sorry but I think you've missed the point. Nobody is "going after" the hosts or the streamers. You can have all the video streams that you want. What is happening is that the sites that INDEX all the streams, and make the streams only a click away from the users, THEY are the sites being targeted. Think of it like this...everyone can have a telephone...but if the telephone directories were suddenly gone, how would you know what number to dial...see what I mean? And it's only a block on these sited in the UK, in the same way as Pirate Bay has been banned in the UK. Anyone viewing these Indexing sites in other countries will be OK to carry on as normal...'til those other countries follow suit one day.

Not sure everyone has got the gist of what is going on here. It won't be the streams that will be affected, so anyone outside of the UK will be unaffected by this. What the situation here is, is that the sites that index the streams, like the one that is mentioned, and behind it will follow the likes of www.crickfree.tv etc are the ones that will be banned. Think of it. Ban one indexing site, and all the streams get affected. Far better than going after the streamers themselves. Somewhere along the way, www.soccer-live.pl will be dragged into the equation, as it too is an indexer of these streams. Whether you think that the speedway audience is too small to be significant is immaterial. The site indexes all sorts of sports including football, so that will be what makes it a target. The loss of the links to the speedway streams will be a by-product. And do you think that they can't make it work? Well, the Newsbin and Pirate Bay sites have effectively been banned now, and they were significant players in the pirate market.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23004880 OK, it's football for now, and a start is being made targeting another site to the one used most of the time for speedway links...but are we seeing the writing appearing on the wall? How long before a site like soccer-live.pl becomes an obvious target for blocking in the UK? And if they did get blocked, would anyone else from another country posting content from that site onto (say) BSF be putting BSF into jeopardy for circumventing the banning order? Minefield approaching folks...careful where you step!

Now there's an idea...The "Saga Insurance Elite League" - Yep, the sure fire way to be cool!

Polish speedway is "cool" in that country. Simple really isn't it? All the "National" companies sponsor the sport. Compare that to the dustbin collectors, scrap metal merchants and Arthur Daley's Used Car Dealers that we have in the UK. That quality of sponsor in Poland gives the sport added credability whereas in GB we are grateful to scrape the bottom of the barrel, as long as some £££ come from it. Where else would away fans charter airliners to take them to their away tracks? (Falubaz fans travelling to Rzeszow) and where else do you find more home fans from out of town than local residents? I was at Zielona Gora trying to find a fan where I could find a pub that was showing speedway last Sunday evening, and every Falubaz fan I spoke to was from 50+km out of town. It was the speedway equivalent of a Man United home match. Poles are patriotic and at an international level, they have riders who they can hang their hats on. That good feeling about the riders and the sport then carries over to the domestic level. Polish stadiums are fantastic places to be. Great viewing, seats if you want to sit, terraces if you want to stand. The Poles have a fan base that is also 30-years per person on average, younger than British fans. That youthfulness comes across in the enthusiasm with which the sport is supported. It makes for a far better atmosphere than what we have in Britain. People of that age congregate where others of that age do too, so adding to the "cool factor", making the support base resiliant. Despite the increased cost of admission since last year, he lowest attendance at Stal Gorzow this season has been 9,400ish - 3 or 4 times, I would guess, what the highest attendance in a GB league meeting has been this year.

Didn't I read somewhere that Belle Vue tried Speedway for a tenner a couple of seasons ago? The result was an initial improvement on the crowd levels which lasted for one or two meetings and then the crowd levels slowly sank down to the old levels resulting in the same numbers turning up as before, and the promoters getting £5-£6 per person less at the turnstiles? Maybe a Belle Vue fan would care to elaborate/correct me on this matter?