Fourentee

Some years ago I interviewed Billy Hamill after one underwhelming away performance, expressed sympathy at his lack of points and gently inquired if there was a technical explanation, receiving the prompt reply: "I rode like a d***head."

Of course. That's the freedom of the forum. But if someone had started a thread and said in the first post something along the lines of: 'The form of Harris is a bit of a worry with the SWC coming up. Should he perhaps be looking at X, Y and Z to improve matters' and made some constructive criticisms, this would probably be a 10-page thread with some positive contributions. As it is, it appears to have been launched simply to have a pop at the rider. Speaking as someone who watches Wolves when the chance arises, and thus partially through gritted teeth, it's never a hardship to see him in action. A standard Harris EL season is seven to eight points and a stack of memories. Wish we had more like him.

It's fair to say that we don't often find ourselves on the same side of a discussion. But I'm genuinely interested, which is why I posed the question in the first place. I phrased it politely and I remain confident that robert72 will respond in kind. He likes to encourage debate (we are on page 112 after all) and appears to post with sufficient frequency to suggest that constraints on his time would not be an issue.

A touch disappointing, to be honest, particularly given such an active poster. It's always interesting when current or former riders give us the benefit of their insight; The Dean Machine, to take just one example at random, is invariably interesting on riding topics (I much admire the comment he made on the current Harris thread) and David Howe, though not a frequent poster, was always worth reading. But there we are, I live in hope.

And the one before that. And the one before that...

Well, I'm a bit of a sucker for 'do you remember when?' threads from a fan perspective and it would be interesting to hear it from the saddle, so to speak. robert72 is a frequent poster so I would hope he could share the relevant insights.

Apologies for repeating a post, particularly one of my own, but it may have been missed in the general run of things. Just wondering if robert72 could take a couple of minutes to respond to this.

That's an interesting aside. Which world champions did you race against, at what level of competition, and what were the results?

And then again maybe, just maybe they won't. Just a hunch.

Is this not a contradiction in terms?

I can understand your embarrassment at making a decision not to attend a match on the unsupported, inexpert advice of one poster. What I don't comprehend is why you show yourself up by pinning the blame on him/her when the logical thing to do is check.

Don't disagree with any of that. Perhaps it would have helped if I'd stressed in the first post that it's the general principle of people coming on and shouting ban that irks me. I prefer the mods to sort it out. Your 'with that freedom comes responsibility' remark seems, to me, to echo Clive James' point about freedom of speech coming with responsibilities: "Yet there are many freedoms which a civilised country must restrict if it is to stay civilised, the classic example being the freedom to shout 'Fire!' in a crowded theatre."

I haven't said anything different. But as a general principle, not just in this instance, I'm not wild about posters coming on shouting for a ban.

Yep, bit of a guilty pleasure!

Gavan, whatever the provocation, should certainly not have responded as he did. Can't say I'm wild about the posters who came on here acting like footballers making card gestures to the referee, mind. Attack the post, report it should you feel it necessary and move on.

Sure, but the swings and roundabouts of that -- especially in a side going well -- under the current format is that the second string will then leapfrog him and on we go again! You really must try to get a grip and understand that a civilised debate on a forum is not trolling just because a poster doesn't agree with your conclusions. You had a go at a poster for saying it was raining and then blamed him for you not making the trip. I suggested that you could try alternative sources. If you think it's trolling, then report it to a mod. I'm sure they don't have better things to do.

I think you make a fair point concerning home advantage, particularly given how few home EL matches have actually been staged so far at the NSS and your ah, how can we put it, interesting and varied city climate. Quite agree on Fricke although by season's end surely his average will be a good bit north of the current six and a half. But surely a must for 2017 regardless.

You would base your entire journey on one poster on a speedway forum? Yeh right...oh, you did.

You actually made that decision on the basis of one poster on a speedway forum? And think it reflects on him rather than you? Here's a couple of useful links for future reference. http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/ http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/forecast/

You need to start.

Yes. At a place called Leicester. You may have heard of it. http://speedwayupdates.proboards.com/thread/13047/ben-fund-bonanza-leicester-2014 http://www.srbf.co.uk/gallery/2014/

Keep floundering.

You said it exactly as I have rightly put it. It's called quoting. You seriously don't know the difference between small and smaller? Read it again and have another go.

At Wolfie's time of life he may be wanting to sit down (sorry mate!) and according to the club website that's £20 (or £23 for premium).

Athletics, tennis and boxing are smaller sports than speedway?