mikebv Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 I dare say that the War Room at Speedway Star Towers is now a seething hotbed of activity with plans being made to investigate the matter down to the the "n"th degree. The meeting rooms will be busily hosting crash refresher courses for all the journalists on how to ask a searching question. Strategies will be hatched on how to excuse the British Referee, the British Race Director, the British shale supplier and the British Promotions company, and how to blame those pesky Poles for all that is wrong with the world. Can't wait to see what comes of all this. The Polish equivalent of Nigel Farage is already questioning "why are so many Brits allowed to work in Poland who simply cost this country money!" 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mdmc82 Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Any news on how Batchelor is after his crashes. Appeared to be holding his hand after both. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
horneymikh Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 So the result stands? Will there be any refunds for the fans that were short changed tonight that went? Janowski must be hacked off that his first race wasn't pulled back. Very sorry start to the GP series Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazy robin Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Any news on how Batchelor is after his crashes. Appeared to be holding his hand after both. It has been mentioned that he won't ride again until the next GP so even more good news for us Robins fans. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazy robin Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Any news on how Batchelor is after his crashes. Appeared to be holding his hand after both. It has been mentioned that he won't ride again until the next GP so even more good news for us Robins fans. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magnificentseven Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Having endured the farce of the Warsaw GP at least we can look forward to the next GP. That is until you realise it is at Tampere - another rubbish track with rubbish follow the leader racing. If any new fans who watched tonight's debacle on TV do tune in for the next one they will certainly give up after that. Wolfie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fromafar Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 I do suspect that tonight will be a very significant turning-point for the sport at international level. To me, the sport's been trying to over-reach itself for many years, based on the ability to pull off meetings at Cardiff, although that's been a very close-run thing on a few occasions. Trying to take the sport to a new stature and level of public awareness are of course noble ambitions but I do wonder if the sport simply has the resources to pull off these grandiose schemes often enough? Is this a brown ale sport pretending it drinks champagne? (No Darcy Ward jokes please - there's a separate thread for that). Just how far can speedway reach? Is it wiser to play it safe, run meetings on tracks that can allow a decent product to be offered to the world or do we keep aiming too high and falling on our noses? Yes, it does work sometimes but you cannot build a sport on just atmosphere and hype. You can fool some of the people etc. etc. What we saw tonight was simply deplorable. It was like seeing a former love in the gutter, begging for fags or another drink. Jim Lawrence was not in control. The failure to exclude Troy Batchelor was questionable but the inability to either see the problem with the starting gate or why riders were pulling-up, or simply to choose to plough on regardless was simply unacceptable. The Grand Prix tries to provide us with the best riders, the best stadia and best racing. Is Jim Lawrence one of the best referees? If so, we need an urgent training programme! His on-screen body language during the early problems was worrying. It did not look like someone in control, and I've been in the company of enough referees over the years to have a clue about this. Regarding the role of the Race Director, Phil Morris faced three crises in his first meeting - practice, starting gate and then the track break-up. The fact that the meeting failed after 12 heats shows that it was not a happy start. But his predecessor in the role Tony Olsson was clearly there, as seen on TV and I presume that his predecessor Ole Olsen was also present, given that he was in charge of the track installation. Surely either or both were on hand to advise? Just how many times will we suffer these fiascos and just how many more times will we hear that lessons have been learnt and that the problem can't happen again? It has. It has many times. It's been happening for years, even back at Wembley, such as 1975. Speedway cocks up, eventually. Gelsenkirchen, Riga, Ullevi. The list goes on. I am certain that BSI's rivals One Sport will be delighted to see them fail so spectacularly in the most prominent stadium in Poland. Is this a turning-point in speedway politics that sees Poland trying to take control of the sport it already financially owns? (Ask any rider fined by a Polish club for getting injured riding for a team outside the country, or at least threatened regarding that latter point) It's time for the sport at ALL levels to live within its means, to stop thinking that a few flashy risks will bring riches. They won't. Solid development will, putting good value for money meetings on at sustainable venues. Let people grow to love an all-action sport rather than use smoke and mirrors to convince people that crap is gold-plated. It's time to focus on the product, the racing, not the wrapping. Then, once the product is strong enough, organisationally and financially then take it to those higher levels. We can see some great racing at GPs. Not enough though. Any fool can reach for the stars and fall. To get there you have to do more than reach, you have to build on solid foundations. In Britain, in a week of generally fine spring weather we have staged how many meetings at out highest level? Two. Just two. This is to accommodate tonight's hubris in Poland. That's a high price to pay and once again the British public have been mugged as much as those fools who think that flying to Poland's going to automatically give them great speedway. Still, the atmosphere was great I suppose and the beer was cheap., Who needs more? So far this year for various reasons, notably health I've no been able to get to any live speedway. Fortunately that's changing and I can hopefully start getting to some league matches, ideally in the PL or NL. I'll leave the rest of you to be dazzled by the shiny shiny....... Speedway cannot afford to self-destruct like this yet again. Sadly it will. It mustn't. (P.S. - "So, this time in English please Tomasz.....") Good post,their obsession with Temporary Tracks in indoor stadiums just to attract big crowds thinking the meeting will go ahead whatever the weather is backfiring big time plus the racing is not up to scratch IMO.Would not dream of attending these Gps.The riders seem to have went along with it though but now they are having 2nd thoughts because of the injuries they are receiving IMO .The throttle works both ways though !! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WembleyLion Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 (edited) What we saw tonight was simply deplorable. It was like seeing a former love in the gutter, begging for fags or another drink. Jim Lawrence was not in control. The failure to exclude Troy Batchelor was questionable but the inability to either see the problem with the starting gate or why riders were pulling-up, or simply to choose to plough on regardless was simply unacceptable. The Grand Prix tries to provide us with the best riders, the best stadia and best racing. Is Jim Lawrence one of the best referees? If so, we need an urgent training programme! His on-screen body language during the early problems was worrying. It did not look like someone in control ... (P.S. - "So, this time in English please Tomasz.....") I have for sometime considered Jim Lawrence to be a poor referee but then again I think the same about Tony Steele. It seems to me that they just get themselves into these cosy positions at the top of International Speedway based more on who they know rather than any ability they might have. Edited April 18, 2015 by WembleyLion 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mdmc82 Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 It has been mentioned that he won't ride again until the next GP so even more good news for us Robins fans. Oh no, that is bad news. Feel for him and Swindon fans. Not a great start to the season. Thanks for the update 👍 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G the Bee Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 (edited) I'm just left bewildered by the whole thing. Yes it was a balls-up from the beginning but, with the exception of the starting gate issue, I saw nothing that we haven't seen on countless other temporary tracks. Yes it was rutty and bumpy, but riders were hardly two-wheeling into the corners. A few riders fell, but riders have falls all the time, irrespective of ruts. And on these temporary tracks, there will be ruts and riders will fall off. It's not ideal but it happens. Look at the ruts and bumps when Bomber won at Cardiff. A quick YouTube search will show you that the track tonight was no worse than that. I just wonder, when the riders were sitting in their briefing, how many of them considered the thousands of fans who had paid their money to be there. Some who had paid hundreds of pounds plus to attend. And who now, with the meeting result declared, are left short changed (irrespective of any compensation package which may or may not be forthcoming from the organisers). Why was there a will to 'get on with it' back when the GP was initially brought into these stadiums, which seems to have disappeared now? What happened to 'the show must go on'? And before anyone pipes up with that old chestnut of 'rider safety is paramount', unfortunately riders get injured. It's an unfortunate part of our sport. But I've seen plenty of riders injured on 'ideally' prepared tracks. All riders know that the GP temporary tracks are inconsistent. When they sign up for the GP, surely they understand that there is a good chance that some of the racing surfaces they are faced with will be less than ideal. But, of course, I'm not a rider, so I'm not allowed to comment on this, I suppose. Edited April 18, 2015 by G the Bee 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cityrebel Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Glad ive not forked out on Cardiff yet think im going to wait a while and see how we go from here. What with league speedway seemingly having guests or r/r for every fixture and now the sports showpiece decending into farce this sport continues to shoot itself in the foot, its certainly not the sport that i was brought up on it really is hard to see how it can survive in it's present form. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Humphrey Appleby Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Can't BSI afford two starting gates? I don't think Meridian Lifts can run to sponsoring the starting gate as well as the two minute clock. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fromafar Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 I'm just left bewildered by the whole thing. Yes it was a balls-up from the beginning but, with the exception of the starting gate issue, I saw nothing that we haven't seen on countless other temporary tracks. Yes it was rutty and bumpy, but riders were hardly two-wheeling into the corners. A few riders fell, but riders have falls all the time, irrespective of ruts. And in these temporary tracks, there will be ruts and riders will fall off. It's not ideal but it happens. Look at the ruts and bumps when Bomber won at Cardiff. A quick YouTube search will show you that the track tonight was no worse than that. I just wonder, when the riders were sitting in their briefing, how many of them considered the thousands of fans who had paid their money to be there. Some who had paid hundreds of pounds plus to attend. And who now, with the meeting declared are left short changed (irrespective of any compensation package which may or may not be forthcoming from the organisers). Why was there a will to 'get on with it' back when the GP was initially brought into these stadiums, which seems to have disappeared now. What happened to 'the show must go on'? And before anyone pipes up with that old chestnut of 'rider safety is paramount', riders get injured. It's an unfortunate part of our sport. But I've seen plenty of riders injured on 'ideally' prepared tracks. All riders know that the GP temporary tracks are inconsistent. When they sign up for the GP, surely they understand that there is a good chance that some of the racing surfaces they are faced with will be less than ideal. But, of course, I'm not a rider, so I'm not allowed to comment on this, I suppose. Exactly the riders have double standards when it suits them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Humphrey Appleby Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Heads need to roll for this. So glad we didn't bother going out to this, About time we heard from the faceless wonders from BSI. You're forgetting that Phillipe already made it clear that the PZM are running this GP. BSI can't be expected to think about making the starting gate work... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WembleyLion Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 (edited) CANNOT defend the indefensible ln his occasion but need to calm down before making any further comment other than heads must surely roll now given that lessons we were promised would be learned quite plainly have not. Glad to hear these comments from you Phil although I think you would have a job covering backs to the extent you did in Riga! Edited April 18, 2015 by WembleyLion Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Humphrey Appleby Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Tomasz Gollob's Golden Legacy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric i Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 (edited) We have had loads of tracks worse than that, is this setting a precedent whereby every time the track ruts up the riders abandon the GP. Edited April 18, 2015 by eric i 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Humphrey Appleby Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 We have had loads of tracks worse than that, is this setting a precedent whereby every time the track ruts up the riders abandon the GP. That there have been worse tracks is hardly a recommendation. Maybe the riders have just got sick of the amateurish organisation. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SCB Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Anyone with a copy of the 2007 British GP who is defending this call off should watch that meeting again. The track had plenty of ruts and bumps but we still had a great meeting. Was the track really that bad? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maddas69 Posted April 18, 2015 Report Share Posted April 18, 2015 Anyone with a copy of the 2007 British GP who is defending this call off should watch that meeting again. The track had plenty of ruts and bumps but we still had a great meeting. Was the track really that bad? No it wasn`t that bad, but at some point the riders had to refuse these extremely dangerous one-off tracks. It has been going on for years, riders being pushed into riding in attrocious conditions risking their lives every time. Bring back Bydgodszcz! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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