IainB

It ain't Cov though is it... you may as well call them the Timbuktu Tigers

I have been to 2 matches this season where there has been inadequate medical cover to keep the meeting running. Peterborough a few weeks ago and KL last night. Are there any rules as regards medical cover or is it up to each club to do what they see fit? What does your club do? When I was having a moan on the Peterborough thread about the lack of a second ambulance Neil Watson came on to correct me that there was a second ambulance but it was the paramedics decision to call a county ambulance. I wonder why that was? Were the ambulances in attendance inadequate? Did the paramedic have to stay with the injured rider? Was there only one paramedic in attendance? Should there be 2? At KL last night, only 1 ambulance in attendance, they had to ring around to try and get another one out after it was discovered that the county ambulance was going to take 3 hours to get there. Anybody that has ever had to call an ambulance these days knows that the days of them turning up within minutes are long gone. I've been going to Speedway for 40 years now and have been to many many tracks where ambulances have had to take injured riders off to hospital, sometimes the meeting continues as there is adequate provision in place for it to do so and other times there has been a massive delay with disgruntled fans streaming away vowing never to return... It does seem a bit of a lottery

So I decided to go to this against my better judgement having attended the KOC match back in May, I thought surely this won't take as long to run as that did (2hrs 10mins for 15 races)... how about 2hrs 45mins for 6 races. But it was a nice day and I spent the late afternoon having a look around KL old town, which is very nice if you've never been, quite a surprise. Then the Speedway... The 2 minutes go on for heat 1... and is then cancelled, somebody's trying to play the sun delay card (not sure if it was the riders or the ref?), fortunately that was ignored until it became a real problem.... here we go I thought, it's going to be another one of those nights. Then we had the first accident, I'm not going to get into that as obviously no one wants that to happen and we all obviously wish both the riders involved the very best but... guess what? This is Speedway, incidents like this are always going to happen sooner or later, what you can do as a Speedway promotion is to have a workable plan for when this does happen. The obvious plan is to have 2 ambulances/medical teams in attendance, problem solved, the match can continue. To have one ambulance/medical team in attendance is risky, to then call an ambulance and expect it to turn up on demand in this day and age is, unfortunately, unrealistic. The ambulance has to go off to hospital, so what do you do then? Well they could have had a backup arranged maybe? Maybe have arranged for a private ambulance firm to be "on call" rather than in attendance. Call the meeting off, knowing that by the time that the ambulance had actually left the track it was going to be unrealistic for the match to be concluded... No what we got was 2 hours of music only to be interspersed for the first hour with announcements of we can't tell you anything and we can't interview the riders. In today's day and age this is totally unacceptable. As I mentioned above we live in an information age, people crave information, it's easier than ever to give it and get it (unless you're a Rye House fan!). I'm by nature a very cynical man these days as far as Speedway is concerned and part of me is thinking they were going to do anything to get heat 6 out of the way, I hope I'm proved wrong on this, but at best I only half expect a fiver reduction on production of last nights ticket. Well full re-admission or a fiver off, that's me and KL Speedway through! I shall not be returning again!

I've been to a number of these "one offs" over the years The fans were informed but not nearly as much as they should have been in a delay of over 2 hours! We live in an information age, it's not acceptable to just stick music on anymore, it's easier than ever to get and give information (perhaps not give information at KL with the ridiculous situation with the mic!) A cynical person may say it was more to do with getting heat 6 over and done with but I wait to be proven wrong by that They could have had 2 medical teams available... like many, many tracks have done throughout the years I've been watching Speedway. Motorsports are dangerous and this situation is always possible, as a promoter you've got to weigh up the potential disgruntlement of fans against the cost of a 2nd medical unit. I wonder if this would have happened at a televised meeting? who decided to only have one medical team? the mic was a joke

All of a sudden there are 2 ambulances on the track... About 3 hours too late, it's just comical now

It's a good job they did wait for the ambulance to return add it's out on the track again... As the rest of the crowd leaves

What's gone wrong is that the NHS is broken and it was going to take 3 hours for an ambulance to arrive

I don't know why they don't just call this off... Half the crowd has gone home feeling mugged off, cancel it, restage it, re-admit free

Coming to Speedway and King's Lynn Speedway especially is like buying a national lottery ticket... Invariably you lose but occasionally just occasionally you're a winner. Tonight as usual I'm a loser... Why do tracks run with one ambulance? It seems running r/r so often has now been extended to ambulances add to that a total lack of information for around 45 minutes and then when there is info and interviews the mic keeps pushing up it's no wonder people are streaming out of the stadium! And all this at the home of the tractor driver that's running the sport. 21:50 I'm still here still playing the lottery ATB to Lewis

Not enough riders Don't forget BV! You'll have your work cut out reporting on this and the goings on at Cov! Another postponement with no reason given... Just like Rye

Has Mick sold all of his assets off yet?

http://www.edp24.co.uk/sport/king-s-lynn-stars-1-5589186

And the fans lol... self cleaning shale, what a brilliant idea! Glasgow? Hot day? Cannot compute!

Perhaps it was just last night then... I'm normally sat on my perch on the first bend

I've never noticed a problem when I've been to Sheffield... it does seem to be a problem at Leicester this year particularly

maybe not if you water it early enough

it's a new one to me... admittedly I don't follow the rules as closely as I once did... still can't see the point of it though

That's funny you should say that because I have watched countless meetings in foreign countries where they just water the whole of the track inside and out, yes it's tricky for a race or two but that's down to the rider to handle. It's only in this country that the watering of the inside line doesn't happen... I wonder if you could equate people going home covered in dust to a lack of attendances?

Stop talking about the team!

Is that a new rule then? What's the point in that? The managers are working in a straight jacket enough as it is without silliness like this

Does the highest average have to ride at No1 then?

The rider parade at Leicester really does sum the sport up... it's a complete shambles! It's a pity riders don't show this much enthusiasm to get on with it all the time. They're pushing off before the final riders have been read out, which is rude at best and shambolic at worst. What was Charles Wright up to during the parade, went to push off, realised the parade wasn't over and stopped and then just stayed there in the middle of the track while the parade continued. Then there were 5 or 6 burly men stood across the track to stop the riders pushing off before the parade was finished, about as much use as a chocolate teapot as they all just shrugged their shoulders as the riders just barged through them. Then Dave Darcy comes onto the PA to have a snide go at some of the fans! Unbelievable what other sport would you get this in? If he's got an issue with some of the people posting on forums, come on to the forum to address it, don't wash your dirty laundry in public. The guy from Sheffield seems to be doing the track now, it's turning into a bit of a Sheffield lite at Leicester these days. Again there were dust issues this week but at least there was some watering during the meeting this week, although what the point was of watering the track in areas that nobody has ever been to is beyond me but that seems to be something that has always happened in this country... all the riders riding around the inside creating clouds of dust... so we'll just water the very outside of the track. You just don't see this in Poland, they just flood the track, all of it and the riders have to deal with it and the punters don't go home covered in dust. When the dust got too much I moved from my spot on the first bend up to bends 3 and 4 and what struck me was how little of the track is used. It seems if you enter bend 3 more than 2 meters from the line the likelihood is you're going to come off or get into extreme difficulty. Anyway it was a nice evening weather wise, the match was run at a lightning pace, until the sun delay, I wonder if they were trying to get it done and dusted before the sun issues? It wasn't a massive delay like it has been in the past, so thumbs up there. There were 2 or 3 good races but at least the scoreline kept it interesting, Lions seemed home and dry mid-meeting then Wolves put on a stellar fight back. Ricky Wells has certainly set himself a high benchmark for the rest of the season, Kenneth Bjerre's form as a No1 is still a worry though, I don't know why HA isn't riding No1?

I'm not really interested... But I shall pop along and have a look in the hope of some entertainment. I wonder if the promotion can confirm whether there'll be a sun delay or not and if so how long will it be? Also will there be any decent racing?

As is naming him

YES it does if you're running a team sport, because we all know it's not "a rider", how often have we seen teams run r/r and 3 or 4 guests. FRN is the right way to go, it should be run on the night that is most favourable to the club though, if that means do away with foreign/GP riders so be it