Speedway Star Toothless Pussycat

[Humphrey Appleby]

YOU obviously weren't there!

I was in Munich and the stadium was fairly full. I think its capacity at the time was around 50K, so it's not unreasonable to assume it compared to if not exceeded Cardiff.

 

As to how many actually paid is another issue, but then you could say the same about Cardiff.

 

Yes, the track was rubbish but since when has a good track been a pre-requisite for GP either?

[foamfence]

YOU obviously weren't there!

 

WHERE are you talking about?

Odsal.

[Conkers in Gravy]

World Finals in Britain would probably have attracted bigger crowds if they had been held at Cardiff (putting aside the fact the Millennium Stadium wasn't opened until 1999), but it took BSI and the grand prix series to take the world championship up a level in terms of professionalism and presentation. It was BSI who had the imagination to take the GP series to Cardiff and as a result British speedway enjoys a big day out with 40,000ish fans ,every year - not once every five or six years.

 

It would be nice if BSI were to invest in British speedway, but I don't see how that could happen. Would they invest in Poland, Sweden and Denmark too? If they did, then £3m (if that is the figure) doesn't go very far.

 

For my money, BSI have done a good job in raising standards in the world championship. I loved the old world finals, but by the end they were pretty poor (Pocking in 93 was a shambles). BSI have provided speedway with a quality flagship which ought to raise interest in the sport. It's British speedway's problem if it can't keep up.

[Humphrey Appleby]

So you've found one World Final, reported crowd of 41,000 which is there or thereabouts with what Cardiff gets. Of course that figure may well be exaggerated, as most of the Wembley attendances were.

I think Munich was reported as 50K which was probably exaggerated, but the stadium was fairly full (unlike Cardiff).

 

You're also assuming the Cardiff (and other GP) figures aren't exaggerated as well, which many believe are. And others on here have also reported tickets being given away on the day for low prices.

[oldace]

I think Munich was reported as 50K which was probably exaggerated, but the stadium was fairly full (unlike Cardiff).

 

You're also assuming the Cardiff (and other GP) figures aren't exaggerated as well, which many believe are. And others on here have also reported tickets being given away on the day for low prices.

 

Its called "dressing the house, the art of making a venue look full with only two thirds capacity in there

 

 

Now then, Now then.

 

The official figure released by the BSPA at the time was 26,418.

 

Is there a suggestion that a BSPA Press Release may have been inaccurate?

That would be a sensation.

 

.

 

Its no secret that attendances were always inflated in the press releases. It is where the 92,000 in 1981 came from when the real crowd was only 72,000

[The White Knight]

World Finals in Britain would probably have attracted bigger crowds if they had been held at Cardiff (putting aside the fact the Millennium Stadium wasn't opened until 1999), but it took BSI and the grand prix series to take the world championship up a level in terms of professionalism and presentation. It was BSI who had the imagination to take the GP series to Cardiff and as a result British speedway enjoys a big day out with 40,000ish fans ,every year - not once every five or six years.

 

It would be nice if BSI were to invest in British speedway, but I don't see how that could happen. Would they invest in Poland, Sweden and Denmark too? If they did, then £3m (if that is the figure) doesn't go very far.

 

For my money, BSI have done a good job in raising standards in the world championship. I loved the old world finals, but by the end they were pretty poor (Pocking in 93 was a shambles). BSI have provided speedway with a quality flagship which ought to raise interest in the sport. It's British speedway's problem if it can't keep up.

 

But it doesn't do that - does it? :sad:

[Trees]

BSI/IMG certainly don't seem to be able to get speedway press coverage in the tabloids, you'd think such a huge company would have good media contacts/hold some sway?

BSI/IMG certainly don't seem to be able to get speedway press coverage in the tabloids, you'd think such a huge company would have good media contacts/hold some sway?

[Conkers in Gravy]

 

But it doesn't do that - does it? :sad:

 

Maybe it hasn't had that effect, but I don't blame BSI for that. British speedway's problems are more at their own door. Several of my non-speedway supporting friends watched the last two or three GPs last season on TV because Tai Woffinden was close to winning the title. I very much doubt they'd bother to go down to a local track for 15 minutes and that's yer lot on a mediocre track with poor facilities. Take the GPs out of the sport and the best meeting you've got is last season's ELRC or the British Final and the sport disappears further into obscurity.

[PHILIPRISING]

THINK you are assuming that interest in the sport automatically equates to going to league matches. It doesn't. Many of my friends are avid GP watchers, often view league matches, but wild horses wouldn't drag them to a league match ... for all sorts of reasons.

 

So, do they have any value for speedway is this country? Perhaps not, but they help swell the Sky viewing figures which in turn translates to much need TV money coming into the sport. What happens to it after that is another matter of course.

BSI/IMG certainly don't seem to be able to get speedway press coverage in the tabloids, you'd think such a huge company would have good media contacts/hold some sway?
BSI/IMG certainly don't seem to be able to get speedway press coverage in the tabloids, you'd think such a huge company would have good media contacts/hold some sway?

SPEEDWAY in this country just doesn't show up on the radar of the written media these days, although BSI proved a point with the coverage they helped manufacture for Tai Woffinden after his World Championship victory. The lack of British success, and more so at team rather than individual levels, is just one factor in why the British media shun speedway.

 

But, to be honest, they are not mad keen on motorsports in general (outside of F1) and particularly motorcycle events. It doesn't sell newspapers, pure and simple.

 

It is not a reflection of the product, rather the attitude of Sports Editors who cannot see much further than the mainstream sports like soccer, rugby and cricket.

[oldace]

 

But it doesn't do that - does it? :sad:

 

 

So lets get this straight cos I am a little confused

 

Plenty of people on here, you amongst them, have alluded to the fact that the sport needs to market itself more, create awareness, that kind of thing.

 

Yet for 18 years the sport has been able to showcase its Premier competition directly into the living rooms of between 60,000 and 100,000 people each week, It has had millions from SKY to show league matches, this money should have been used to give free entry to all tv matches, make a big crowd, make the thing look exiting and hopefully a % of the people will come back and yet all it has done is stuffed the money into the back pockets of a bunch of mercenaries and carried on with the same tired old presentation in front of one man and his dog.

 

Still we can blame SKY or BSI and carry on with the tried and tested method of sending a rider and bike to a WI jumble sale, thats the kind of exposure we should be looking at isn't it

[Grand Central]

Just on the subject of the Munich 1989 attendance.

Being there at the time I remember it as being quite a good crowd more as Humphrey has said.

I don't know what the PR figure was, what the true figure was or whether it had been 'dressed'.

 

This set of images I found pretty much show the whole arena.

So someone who really cares can start counting!

 

Munich

 

.

Edited February 4, 2014 by Grand Central

[The White Knight]

 

 

So lets get this straight cos I am a little confused

 

Plenty of people on here, you amongst them, have alluded to the fact that the sport needs to market itself more, create awareness, that kind of thing.

 

Yet for 18 years the sport has been able to showcase its Premier competition directly into the living rooms of between 60,000 and 100,000 people each week, It has had millions from SKY to show league matches, this money should have been used to give free entry to all tv matches, make a big crowd, make the thing look exiting and hopefully a % of the people will come back and yet all it has done is stuffed the money into the back pockets of a bunch of mercenaries and carried on with the same tired old presentation in front of one man and his dog.

 

Still we can blame SKY or BSI and carry on with the tried and tested method of sending a rider and bike to a WI jumble sale, thats the kind of exposure we should be looking at isn't it

 

Yes - you are right - I agree with you.

 

Where it all went wrong, you allude to in the second highlighted part of your Post. For THAT reason SKY's continuing involvement with Speedway is NOT doing the job it was/is supposed to do.

 

That money should have been used to push the Sport, raise it's profile - at least we can agree on something.

[oldace]

 

Yes - you are right - I agree with you.

 

Where it all went wrong, you allude to in the second highlighted part of your Post. For THAT reason SKY's continuing involvement with Speedway is NOT doing the job it was/is supposed to do.

 

That money should have been used to push the Sport, raise it's profile - at least we can agree on something.

 

 

SKY have had no input as to how the money was used. The fact is British Speedway has had a glorious opportunity to advance over the last 18 years, an opportunity other sports had and embraced, sports like darts, Rugby League even cycling. Has being on live TV for the whole 3 weeks affected crowds at the Ally Pally or the Premier League of darts? In the early days they played in smaller venues but packed them out, encouraged the party atmosphere and created the impression that this is a must attend event. That is what speedway should have done.

 

The fact that British Speedway is in the mess it is lies solely 100% at the feet of British Speedway. Not SKY or BSI or anyone else.

 

With a new TV deal now is the time to change things around

[The White Knight]

 

 

SKY have had no input as to how the money was used. The fact is British Speedway has had a glorious opportunity to advance over the last 18 years, an opportunity other sports had and embraced, sports like darts, Rugby League even cycling. Has being on live TV for the whole 3 weeks affected crowds at the Ally Pally or the Premier League of darts? In the early days they played in smaller venues but packed them out, encouraged the party atmosphere and created the impression that this is a must attend event. That is what speedway should have done.

 

The fact that British Speedway is in the mess it is lies solely 100% at the feet of British Speedway. Not SKY or BSI or anyone else.

 

With a new TV deal now is the time to change things around

 

I hope they are listening.

[BWitcher]

 

 

SKY have had no input as to how the money was used. The fact is British Speedway has had a glorious opportunity to advance over the last 18 years, an opportunity other sports had and embraced, sports like darts, Rugby League even cycling. Has being on live TV for the whole 3 weeks affected crowds at the Ally Pally or the Premier League of darts? In the early days they played in smaller venues but packed them out, encouraged the party atmosphere and created the impression that this is a must attend event. That is what speedway should have done.

 

The fact that British Speedway is in the mess it is lies solely 100% at the feet of British Speedway. Not SKY or BSI or anyone else.

 

With a new TV deal now is the time to change things around

Absolutely 100% spot on.

 

It's not rocket science is it.

[oldace]

 

Yes - you are right

 

 

I usually am!!!!!

[The White Knight]

 

 

I usually am!!!!!

 

Not always though................................................

[bellevueace]

SO you are saying that those riders who boycott the UK do so because of the GPs? Nothing to do with the money on offer in Poland and, to a lesser extent, Sweden and elsewhere. Not that many riders simply do not wish to commute to the UK to race when there is plenty of alternative employment.

 

Riders like Bjerre, Iversen, Ward, Woffinden, and Zagar prove that if the mind is willing the GPs do not stand in the way of the top riders racing here.

 

Don't accept that the annual crowd at Cardiff is on a downward spiral and, frankly, the attendance is quite impressive given that it is probably about the same figure, if not higher, than the number of people who attend speedway in the UK on a regular basis.

 

That's five out of the sixteen GP riders, riders themselves have actually stated they would ride in the EL if it wasn't for the amount of league matches considering their schedule as regards to the GP so I would say it does have some effect, likewise the falling crowds for league meetings prove that television exposure is not having the desired effect on the sport that some thought it would, as for Cardiff released figures have shown a drop off on attendances from the first time the event was staged, for a one off meeting in a state of the art stadium with all the worlds top riders I don't think under 40,000 is impressive at all, a half full stadium when you take into consideration the attendance is made up of every team in the country be it EL,PL,NL, a far cry from when these kind of meetings were into six figures, apart from disrupting the bread and butter of league the GP hasn't really made that much impact at all with the wider general public, in fact the sport is losing support.

[oldace]

 

That's five out of the sixteen GP riders, riders themselves have actually stated they would ride in the EL if it wasn't for the amount of league matches considering their schedule as regards to the GP so I would say it does have some effect, likewise the falling crowds for league meetings prove that television exposure is not having the desired effect on the sport that some thought it would, as for Cardiff released figures have shown a drop off on attendances from the first time the event was staged, for a one off meeting in a state of the art stadium with all the worlds top riders I don't think under 40,000 is impressive at all, a half full stadium when you take into consideration the attendance is made up of every team in the country be it EL,PL,NL, a far cry from when these kind of meetings were into six figures, apart from disrupting the bread and butter of league the GP hasn't really made that much impact at all with the wider general public, in fact the sport is losing support.

 

No meeting in Britain has ever attracted 6 figures. A few times into 90,000s

[Humphrey Appleby]

World Finals in Britain would probably have attracted bigger crowds if they had been held at Cardiff (putting aside the fact the Millennium Stadium wasn't opened until 1999), but it took BSI and the grand prix series to take the world championship up a level in terms of professionalism and presentation.

For my money, BSI have done a good job in raising standards in the world championship. I loved the old world finals, but by the end they were pretty poor (Pocking in 93 was a shambles). BSI have provided speedway with a quality flagship which ought to raise interest in the sport. It's British speedway's problem if it can't keep up.

 

I'd agree that speedway would disappear further into obscurity without the SGP, but I don't think it's especially raised the game. It looks good in comparison to the rest of the speedway shambles, but that's a very low bar indeed and I don't think the SGP has really progressed the sport as it should.

 

The Millennium Stadium round is clearly used as something of a showcase, but I think if you held a World Final there today you'd probably get a similar attendance. Beyond that, GP attendances are reasonable in Poland, but elsewhere not better than in the latter years of the World Finals. Mainstream media coverage is still virtually nil, and the list of sponsors basically seems to be tourist boards, local media and the companies of the host promoters. Monster was probably the first 'big' sponsor the series has had, but what they're actually paying is a big question.

 

As for taking the sport to big cities, well BSI can reasonably point to Cardiff and Copenhagen and the recent addition of Stockholm (and Auckland perhaps), but that has to be offset against small obscure venues that would probably never have been considered for World Finals (although if you can go to Norden and Pocking then you can go anywhere).

 

So on balance I don't think the improvements are actually so dramatic. Yes, it's a fair point the sport may well have declined further without the SGP, some revenue has been generated that may not have been there before, but neither do I think the sport has been revolutionised either.

 

Finally, you can't compare the SGP and British speedway. The SGP is 12 events organised with the pick-of-the-dates and on the basis of getting the participating riders on the cheap.

 

Even a single British track organises more meetings than that per season, but having to work around all sorts of constraints with dates and rider availability. They also have to pay the going rates for wages, put up with the vagaries of the weather (particularly early and late in the season), whilst also providing the opportunities for riders to come through the ranks.