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Tony Briggs How Good Could He Have Been.?


Sidney the robin

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Just wondered how far Tony Briggs could of gone in speedway if it was not for his serious neck injuries.I remember seeing him first at Reading in the Sarjeants tools two legged affair with Swindon he looked a prospect a real tough act to follow in Briggo seniors footsteps.One thing i do remember was he was a very poor gater and often had to scrap for points from the back.I remember one race in particular a second half race at the Abbey with Holloway,Robert Craven,Tony in it Holloway won it Tony came back into the pits and got one hell of a roasting from his dad.I wondered what other forum members opinion was of Tony a hard one really but i have a hunch he would of turned out as a very good rider.

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Young Briggo was a very talented young rider who's career was sadly cut short by injury. I saw him a few times and he certainly looked like he had the ability to go far. I'm sure with his Dad's backing he would have been a star.

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I never rated Tony Briggs that hightly, although I was maybe seeing things from a Swindon bias!

 

A decent second string rider, but maybe he had more talent than I appreciated at the time.

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Just wondered how far Tony Briggs could of gone in speedway if it was not for his serious neck injuries.I remember seeing him first at Reading in the Sarjeants tools two legged affair with Swindon he looked a prospect a real tough act to follow in Briggo seniors footsteps.One thing i do remember was he was a very poor gater and often had to scrap for points from the back.I remember one race in particular a second half race at the Abbey with Holloway,Robert Craven,Tony in it Holloway won it Tony came back into the pits and got one hell of a roasting from his dad.I wondered what other forum members opinion was of Tony a hard one really but i have a hunch he would of turned out as a very good rider.

Saw Tony ride on a number of occasions and it was always going to be difficult for him having a such a dominating father!

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In what way as a rider or a Dad Steve.?

As a dad. I think that even 'Briggo' admits that he may well have been to pushy in Tony's career.

 

Can't be easy being the son of a multi World Champion.

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As a dad. I think that even 'Briggo' admits that he may well have been to pushy in Tony's career.

 

Can't be easy being the son of a multi World Champion.

I can remember that bollocking that he gave Tony at the Abbey.But i can always remember Barry saying Tony had more ability than him at the same age huge praise eh Briggo senior is certainly in my top 7 of all time.
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  • 2 weeks later...

Wayne Briggs, Barry's brother and Tony's uncle, also had a speedway career that was thwarted by injury.

http://www.speedwayatoz.co.uk/pdfs/briggs%20wayne.pdf

 

Here's some background on Tony Briggs' speedway career.

http://wwosbackup.proboards.com/thread/210/tony-briggs


Wasn't Robert Craven Peter's son? Another hard act to follow if so.

 

The career details of Robert Craven:

http://wwosbackup.proboards.com/thread/693/robert-craven

Edited by Guest
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I never rated Tony Briggs that hightly, although I was maybe seeing things from a Swindon bias!

 

A decent second string rider, but maybe he had more talent than I appreciated at the time.

I didn't either, but again in hindsight I guess a 4 point plus average in not only his first season, but in the top flight as well, bearing in mind the standard at the time, is not to be sniffed at. Obviously some of it was the Dave Lanning influence at Reading as well as being Briggo's son , but he just seemed to get more hype around him than any other rider of similar ability. But I guess that wasn't really Tony's fault.

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  • 1 year later...

                                                                                                                                                                  

 

TONY BRIGGS SPEEDWAY....  Duped....On March 5th 1987...Tony and Briggo took me with them on their diamond mining fiasco..deep into the heart of darkest Liberian jungle, so I wrote a book about witchcraft, warlocks n toad dolls.. Kings and Queens of  Johnson and Varney tribes...I was there ....I'll never forget ....time goes by.....hey Tony gotcha..I'm really impressed with your..... n o p a i n b a r r i e r s.......you're going to need them when I get behind you ..think I'll use this page to send you up to date messages...and firstly you owe me $75 wages ye never gave me..... when you should have done ..I remember it very well ..do  you?

 and secondly the guy from down the Mental Elf said, "write it all down", so I did and called it, "Royal Welsh Gold and the Liberian Diamond Connection stitch up"...  get it on www.amazon.co.uk / .com      or go total  www.lulu.com   a real steal of a major deal at £5.99  Tony ....JK   29/10/2020                                                                                                  

                                                                                                                   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by slateweaverjem
just trying to get the chat going
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I remember he won the newcomer of the year award, pipping Hawks' Roman Jankowski (something else those pesky Racers beat us to that year!)

I think he was injured too early in his career to know if he would've made it. I personally feel that he would have, with Briggo's (and probably Mauger's backing.)

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On 7/27/2018 at 12:33 PM, Terry said:

I remember he won the newcomer of the year award, pipping Hawks' Roman Jankowski (something else those pesky Racers beat us to that year!)

I think he was injured too early in his career to know if he would've made it. I personally feel that he would have, with Briggo's (and probably Mauger's backing.)

Style wise he was so much like the old man i can remember him signing his faberge deal with Kevin Keegan and Henry Cooper.Personally i think he would of made it and been world class an exciting rider to watch just like Barry.

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5 hours ago, 25yearfan said:

Tony Briggs had ability and I think could of made a decent League rider but I feel he was a bit over rated and given opportunities others at the same level wouldn't have done cause of his father!

I think the opposite because his dad was so good a legend the pressure on him was immense straight from the start.

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On 7/29/2018 at 1:44 PM, 25yearfan said:

Tony Briggs had ability and I think could of made a decent League rider but I feel he was a bit over rated and given opportunities others at the same level wouldn't have done cause of his father!

I remember reading an article in Peter Collins' Testimonial programme (August 1980) where Richard Bott said that Faberge hadn't wanted to know about sponsoring PC when he was World Champion, yet they agreed to sponsor Tony in that first season, maybe Barry was more persuasive lol. 

 

On 7/27/2018 at 12:33 PM, Terry said:

I remember he won the newcomer of the year award, pipping Hawks' Roman Jankowski (something else those pesky Racers beat us to that year!)

I think he was injured too early in his career to know if he would've made it. I personally feel that he would have, with Briggo's (and probably Mauger's backing.)

I don't remember the first part of your post - I would have thought Roman would have easily been the best newcomer that year! Especially with the reputation unknown Poles had in those days. 

As I said earlier in this post, he did seem a bit over hyped, but then again I don't suppose that was down to him. 

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1 hour ago, Tigerblade said:

 

 

I don't remember the first part of your post - I would have thought Roman would have easily been the best newcomer that year! Especially with the reputation unknown Poles had in those days. 

 

Scanning through an old speedway yearbook it was strange that Tony won the award considering Roman had a higher average and four double figure scores-including a max at Swindon on his first visit.

Unfortunately he didn't really push-on to be another Zenon Plech, although he rode in a couple of world finals in later years.

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On ‎7‎/‎29‎/‎2018 at 6:48 PM, Sidney the robin said:

I think the opposite because his dad was so good a legend the pressure on him was immense straight from the start.

I don't doubt for 1 second that Tony had immense pressure on him because of his fathers success and never said otherwise in my post!

 

Still say he was given more chances than others would have been given!

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52 minutes ago, 25yearfan said:

I don't doubt for 1 second that Tony had immense pressure on him because of his fathers success and never said otherwise in my post!

 

Still say he was given more chances than others would have been given!

How did a novice rider manage to get a deal alongside people who were legends in their sport like Keegan and Cooper otherwise?

Edited by iris123
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