Beeone

WELL SOME OF US DID. IT COST SOMETHING AROUNG £700 FOR ME AND THE MISSUS AND IF YOU THINK THATS FUNNY YOU ARE A PRETTY QUEER FISH IN MY OPINION.

I've just got back from Germany and totally agree. German grand prix, postponed. It is not another Polish GP or anything else. It was not the riders fault that the shale was shipped uncovered in torrential rain.

Twelve and sixpence an hour and all the satsumas he can eat.

I haven't trawled through this whole thread, but I personally don't think Middlo or Rosco or anyone else could have done much better with what is available for selection, I was never a Middlo basher and if the British riders are mainly sh*te quality, what is a manager going to do.

Absolutely right, the Brits were simply not good enough, Scott Nicholls four points, come on, he is our National Champion and Swindon wasn't a foot deep in dirt when he won that was it!!!

And solve the middle east problems, get our troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan, solve the credit crunch, beat inflation, reduce interest rates, lower council tax, feed the people of Darfur, topple Robert Mugabe, stop global warming, stop knife crime and gang related shootings, clean up Amy Winehouse and Pete Doherty and lower fuel prices. And thats just for starters!!!!!!!!!!

Here we go again, 'the track was too slick /grippy / wet / dry!!!', absolute rot, it was the same For everyone if the Danes and Swedes and Rymel could find a setup for it,then our guys should have been able to as well ! As for "our boys are racers". They would find the job easier if they learned to get out of the start once in a while. Mind you that doesn't help much if you are going so slowly that any quality rider can just pass you along the straight!

Anyone who has a programme from last night should make a point of reading Kelvin Tatums article. He makes the point that the Danes have Gunderson training their kids and he says the training schemes in Poland are unbelievable. He also points out that speedway must be the only professional sport in Britain that has absolutely no full time coaches working within it whatsoever! He makes the point that as a former rider, he can see the faults and bad riding habits in certain riders, but that by the time these riders are in their twenties, it is almost impossible to sort these things out, as they need to be spotted and corrected while they are still kids learning the basics. Now I know Kelvin isn't everyones cup of tea, but his article made a lot of sense in my opinion. I know people will keep going on about the number of young Aussies that come over here, but if you look at their top guys, they didn't learn the basics over here, they had done that at home in Australia, as did young Tai, he didn't suddenly learn to ride when he got over here did he! I remember reading last winter about Leigh Adams holding some training sessions down under for young riders, when do any of our young guys get a chance like that?

It never rains in Coventry, so no problem!

I don't give a toss where they are for, my money will be staying in my own bank earning interestfor me, not in BSI's earning it for them for almost a whole year. Rewarding the fans my arse. They must think we were all born yesterday!

So that's one foreigner per team per match if I understand correctly.Does this mean that a club could use maybe three foreign riders during a season for say three matches each, or does it mean that a club may only use one foreigner during a season? If clubs can use only one, then they are surely only going to go for the very best, so all this talk of the Elite Leagues top dozen or more riders disappearing to earn fortunes in Russia seems to be sheer pie in the sky!

: Holy Cow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Complete machine shop! I know Bees have some containers converted as workshops, but I don't think there is anything more sophisticated as an electric drill in them! Mr Sandhu does want to modernise Brandon but I don't think he could quite match this, even if the local planners would let him.

Hi Stomat, First of all your English is pretty good, (certainly better than my Latvian!!!). There was a general decline in crowd numbers in English speedway over a number of years from the 1980s. I do not know why people lost interest in speedway here but it may have been something to do with the speedway authorities constant and confusing changes to the leagues and regulations, I know I stopped going to races myself for quite a long time. Now that speedway is back on TV it does seem to be creating a little more interest, but then my club Coventry have always been one of the better supported teams(figures are not published but I would guess around 2.5-3,000). This may not really answer your question, but it may kick start a bit of a discussion for you. I wish you and your team all the best for the next season.

How could they team ride at second and third in a three man race? From the start Nicholls was off the dead mans gate four wasn't he, just cant see how they could have done it.

I reckon I might be persuaded to go to next years event if they pay me the $200,000. It would take at least that to get me to travel out there again to watch that kind of cr@p racing

I couldn't agree more. Spent a fortune on tickets, travel and hotel, the flights and the hotel were fine and we had a great view of the track (except that we could not see gate four which didn't matter because no one made a decent start from there anyway). The real problem was that we had turned up to see RACING not a series of one minute processions! Interesting to hear about the race off incident which we did not see, for the first time in my life I actually left a speedway meeting before the end, I was simply bored stiff as was my other half and our travelling companions. It must be time to abandon these one off tracks and run all the GPs on real racing tracks where the staff produce decent surfaces week in week out. Yes including Cardiff! I have had some great Weekends there but the racing is usually rubbish unless the track disintegrates. I for one will not be in Germany for any more of that rubbish! Had a nice time in Essen though nice city, nice people.

If anyone is planning to stay over in the city it will be a struggle now to find a room anywhere. Me and the missus have had to book two single rooms. Still, never mind it will save me the rollicking about my drunken snoring!

About a fortnight before the event seems to be par for the course, so don't panic that you haven't got them yet. Different with the world cup tickets however got them about ten days after I ordered them!

What a night, don't know what the neighbours made of the racket I was making! Brilliant performance from Bomber. I agree that it will be a bit more difficult on the tracks that are prepared with a slick surface, but he is such a determined rider that I think he will still manage some decent scores. I just wish the people responsible for track preparation would take notice of the entertaining nature of last nights GP and prepare tracks accordingly. Surely that could only be good for the sport as a whole. Who wants to watch processional gate and win racing? Not Me

Maybe we just have to accept that the way it is ,is the way it is. Right or wrong and whether you like it or not, raving about your perceived injustices on here is not going to change anything. As Nicholls is the number one British rider, maybe we should just try to support him in his efforts.

Do you seriously think though that Andersen or any of the other riders who lost out would have turned down a wild card entry last year if it had been offered,of course not . As I said you'd have to be stupid to do it.

Possibly not but if he had no ambition, surely he would turn doen the wild card. I said earlier that personally I feel that all the riders should have to qualify. The problem I have with your argument is the "begging bowl" thing. It is simply not possible for a rider to beg for a place, the problem is simply that it is currently within BSI's remit to award places. I agree that this is far from ideal, but a rider would have to be pretty stupid to turn the chance if it is offered.

No personal gripes at all? Are you absolutely sure?

I don't pretend to undersand your personal grudge with Nicholls but by your own assertion yes it could. It would be worse if he were not around. As for the begging bowl, I hardly think that applies. As the best we have (whether you like it or not) if BSI have wild cards to allocate then only a very unambitious rider would turn it down, and whatever Nicholls may lack it is not ambition. I personally feel that it would be better if all the GP riders had qualified for the event but this is the kind of thing that happens when the ruling bodies sell the top events to commercial enterprises. Tough luck. We are stuck with it. And it aint Scott Nicholls' fault!