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2017 - 1 Or 2 Fixed Race Nights And When?


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Agreed.

Makes sense to have consecutive nights.

However why would Kings Lynn move from Wednesday to Thursday if Wednesday is one of the suggested days?? Makes no sense.

SKY have covered quite a few Wednesdays even some Tuesdays however Monday is still seen as Speedway night on SKY.

 

It would be nice to hear from the BSPA and promoters engaging the fans to see what days they prefer but I doubt we are a consideration!

Sky losing Champions League football will have an effect on their scheduling plans.

How Speedway fits into that could be a factor in the racenight choice/s .

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Sky losing Champions League football will have an effect on their scheduling plans.

How Speedway fits into that could be a factor in the racenight choice/s .

Remains to be seen if SKY are pro altering speedway night.

I doubt the BSPA would want to lose or alienate them either.

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I like the idea of a window at which point any club can strengthen their team up to the highest average in the league.

Wouldn't work unless it's at a time when clubs have ridden all the A fixtures and equal matches. This is one thing that one fixed night would help with and prevent one team having ridden 12 meetings and another just 6 and unable to get new averages.

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Or how about a transfer window where teams can strengthen up to a team average equal to that of the league leaders? At the moment teams can only go up to 45 or whatever the limit is, so if a team at the top is riding to an average of 50 or 55, a team at the bottom still cannot in theory match them.

 

Where are these riders to strengthen the teams going to come from? All it'll lead to is teams poaching from others in the middle of the season.

 

The point of the point limit is ensure that one team can not be built vastly stronger than another at the beginning of the season, and to ensure the better riders are somewhat shared around. There's nothing wrong with riders improving during the season - that's part of the skill in picking a team in the first place - but it'll just make a farce of the competition if you then let teams build to the level of another team that has improved.

 

I would agree that the points limit as it stands is a bit of joke, and has become an exercise in average manipulation and trying to sign riders on artificially low assessed averages. There's also no encouragement to actually develop a side, but that's a failing of the implementation rather than the concept.

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Most if not all the world's top riders have been asked about riding in Britain again and they all would consider returning if it was feasable to fit in with their frantic schedule of racing in Sweden, Poland and other events.

 

It's understandable that British Speedway comes bottom of the list of in priorities due to various race nights, amount of meetings and obviously the lower pay rates. However if Britain wants an Elite League and the exposure to sponsors of the top names they have to reach some kind of deal that will see them return in some sort.

 

Less meetings

Regular race night

Flexibility of movement to fixtures

 

At present all Premier League tracks operate from Thursday to Sunday while the 8 current Elite League tracks operate on FIVE different race nights with just Poland (Sunday) and Sweden (Tuesday) being kept free.

 

Mondays are the night Sky want for live meetings but the top riders don't want consecutive nights so Wednesday is the most promising night for the Elite League with Sky still showing one meeting on the Monday night.

 

However if Ipswich and Sheffield can be tempted to move up or switch race nights, it could be run on Wednesdays and Thursdays, hopefully with 10 teams. Coventry would be in a new venue and could switch to midweek and the same could be said of Lakeside. Belle Vue and Leicester can ride any night without problem so two race nights can happen.

 

Teams would only meet once home and away giving you 14 or 18 meetings in total. This would mean only 7 or 9 home meetings but at present there are only 14 any way so it could be two home and two away or all tracks enter a British League giving Elite League tracks an extra 6 home meetings (2 groups) and Premier League tracks an extra four home and four away at the Elite League tracks who in British League meetings would not use heat leaders and use their number 8 and National League riders instead.

 

 

It's not as complicated as you think and gives more variety in the fixtures. The Premier League would remain the same as meetings like Berwick v Newcastle would be both a British League and Premier League meeting.

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Wouldn't work unless it's at a time when clubs have ridden all the A fixtures and equal matches. This is one thing that one fixed night would help with and prevent one team having ridden 12 meetings and another just 6 and unable to get new averages.

It would help if all teams had ridden an equal number of meetings but providing there are not too many meetings run difference you could still do it as the averages would not change much. I agree that if it was 12 meetings for one club and 6 for another that then it may be awkward. Maybe a window would encourage all clubs to catch up on meetings not run and then a panic at the end of the season.

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Fixed race nights not practical according to Buster Chapman at the forum today.

 

Which begs the question why did KL move to Thursdays?

Something wrong here. TNT, who was at the fans forum, has stated that the fixed night is a must.("and the only way forward for the EL".)

Edited by Tsunami
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Something wrong here. TNT, who was at the fans forum, has stated that the fixed night is a must.("and the only way forward for the EL".)

Some of Buster's answers were quite long - it is entirely possible that Buster made both statements.

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I guess that means no GP riders and an amalgamation of ;leagues then for 2017

almalgamation sounds good for british speedway,could still involve some gp riders its only the top 6 or so that are a differant level(and differant money )let them go play in poland we can still enjoy our speedway

just an afterthought if uk votes to leave eu how will that impact on speedway

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just an afterthought if uk votes to leave eu how will that impact on speedway

I'd hazard a guess at less than people expect. There may be some restrictions on lesser Poles/Danes/Swedes etc riding in the British leagues but I suspect that post Brexit restrictions on EU workers will largely focus on unskilled workers and may have minimal impact on our sport.

 

Secondly, if you believe Goldman Sachs (and I rarely do), Brexit will lead to devaluation of sterling. If (and it is a big if) that were to happen then we could be faced with several foreign riders leaving the EL/PL (as happened during the economic crisis of 1976).

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Fixed race nights not practical according to Buster Chapman at the forum today.

Which begs the question why did KL move to Thursdays?

 

Hey to differ but Buster said it would be a great move forward for the sport and possibly the only way forward for the Elite League.

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I'd hazard a guess at less than people expect. There may be some restrictions on lesser Poles/Danes/Swedes etc riding in the British leagues but I suspect that post Brexit restrictions on EU workers will largely focus on unskilled workers and may have minimal impact on our sport.

In the unlikely event that the UK leaves the EU, it'll almost certainly sign an agreement to join the EEA which will mean freedom of movement for workers regardless. There are too many British citizens living and working elsewhere in the EU to pull up the drawbridge, which is something the anti-EUers simply don't grasp. The only difference is the UK will have no say in making those agreements, far less a veto.

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After attending the Bspa forum and talking to Buster after I see it that speedway has a few directions it could go in and depending on what changes will determine which direction it goes.

 

 

As I see it in 2017 the Plan A will be to have the Elite League on Wednesday nights with Sky having one of those meetings switched to the Monday night. The hope is that each track will be able to call on the services of at least TWO top riders which will make it an Elite League worthy of the name.

 

Belle Vue, Kings Lynn and Leicester can ride on any night they wish and Poole already ride on a Wednesday. Swindon and Coventry will be in new stadiums and should be able to run on a Wednesday and Wolverhampton can do Wednesday night as it is the alternative night at present. Lakeside have to see where they will be but they too should be able to switch so that shouldn't be a problem.

 

With Premier League already operating Thursday to Sunday it would mean no clashes of dates for riders doubling up. Elite League teams may have two places that are shared so for example Wolverhampton could have Tai Woffinden and Piotr Pawlicki sharing the number one position and Peter Karlsson and Joel Andersson sharing a second string role.

 

Add to that two places could be doubling up riders and two fast track reserves, each team will have a ten man squad including the number eight position. This should eliminate the use of guests and make the Elite League much stronger.

 

 

 

 

Plan B would be to reduce the Elite League to less fixtures on the set nights as in Plan A above and each Elite League track would have a list of four squad riders they can call on for two places in each meeting and one of these would be the number eight so he can cover for injuries to other riders.

 

With less fixtures, every track enters into a British League splitting into two equal groups of 12. With all teams set to the same limit, the clubs riding in the Elite League they could for example use six of their team plus two of the four squad riders to form an 8 man team riding in a format involving 16 scheduled races and two nominated races giving more value for money as the entrance fee could be a few pounds more.

 

 

 

Plan C would be forget the Elite League if tracks can't agree on set nights but while this sounds fine to some, it would cause more harm than good. Firstly those willing to ride here must commit to the league and not be allowed to miss meetings to ride in other leagues which would not only mean no big names but also force many others to leave British speedway.

 

It would also mean any British rider looking at becoming the best he can be would be forced out of the league if they are prevented from riding in other countries to earn considerably more money than Britain can offer. Also the Sky deal would be finished and remember that this is the only real income into the league apart from attendance's and most tracks depend on that money to stay afloat.

 

 

 

It's going to take a lot of changes but one way or another it has to change

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After attending the Bspa forum and talking to Buster after I see it that speedway has a few directions it could go in and depending on what changes will determine which direction it goes.

 

 

As I see it in 2017 the Plan A will be to have the Elite League on Wednesday nights with Sky having one of those meetings switched to the Monday night. The hope is that each track will be able to call on the services of at least TWO top riders which will make it an Elite League worthy of the name.

 

Belle Vue, Kings Lynn and Leicester can ride on any night they wish and Poole already ride on a Wednesday. Swindon and Coventry will be in new stadiums and should be able to run on a Wednesday and Wolverhampton can do Wednesday night as it is the alternative night at present. Lakeside have to see where they will be but they too should be able to switch so that shouldn't be a problem.

 

With Premier League already operating Thursday to Sunday it would mean no clashes of dates for riders doubling up. Elite League teams may have two places that are shared so for example Wolverhampton could have Tai Woffinden and Piotr Pawlicki sharing the number one position and Peter Karlsson and Joel Andersson sharing a second string role.

 

Add to that two places could be doubling up riders and two fast track reserves, each team will have a ten man squad including the number eight position. This should eliminate the use of guests and make the Elite League much stronger.

 

 

 

 

Plan B would be to reduce the Elite League to less fixtures on the set nights as in Plan A above and each Elite League track would have a list of four squad riders they can call on for two places in each meeting and one of these would be the number eight so he can cover for injuries to other riders.

 

With less fixtures, every track enters into a British League splitting into two equal groups of 12. With all teams set to the same limit, the clubs riding in the Elite League they could for example use six of their team plus two of the four squad riders to form an 8 man team riding in a format involving 16 scheduled races and two nominated races giving more value for money as the entrance fee could be a few pounds more.

 

 

 

Plan C would be forget the Elite League if tracks can't agree on set nights but while this sounds fine to some, it would cause more harm than good. Firstly those willing to ride here must commit to the league and not be allowed to miss meetings to ride in other leagues which would not only mean no big names but also force many others to leave British speedway.

 

It would also mean any British rider looking at becoming the best he can be would be forced out of the league if they are prevented from riding in other countries to earn considerably more money than Britain can offer. Also the Sky deal would be finished and remember that this is the only real income into the league apart from attendance's and most tracks depend on that money to stay afloat.

 

 

 

It's going to take a lot of changes but one way or another it has to change

Swindon cannot run on wednesdays unless the dog people change their race night, we can only run Mon, Thurs or Fri.

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