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Blimey..speedway on BBC1!


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Whilst speedway may be a small sport compared to football etc, it is still much bigger than many sports people who do get nominated. Speedway is huge compared to netball, womens cricket, womens swimming. It’s down to what sports the bbc covers and the make up of the panel who chooses the finalists.

If Woffinden was chosen as a finalist he would outscore the Peatys, and the bloke who spins around on a wooden horse, by the proverbial mile. The get to be a finalist in a tiny sport. Speedway as a sport is vastly bigger in every way. But that has no impact on who is picked.

The bbc is now obligated to shows the voting. Woffinden is more than capable of getter enough votes to make third with the amount of fans in the uk. They just won’t have the opportunity to vote for him.

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3 hours ago, BWitcher said:

That's like comparing Lewis Hamilton to the number of people that drive a car.

Not in any way.

Those figures don’t include every single person who has been on a boat in a year. There’s no pedalo users or ferry passengers. 

It does include every person who has taken part in sailing in a single year and er, that’s it.

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3 hours ago, Steve Shovlar said:

Whilst speedway may be a small sport compared to football etc, it is still much bigger than many sports people who do get nominated. Speedway is huge compared to netball, womens cricket, womens swimming. It’s down to what sports the bbc covers and the make up of the panel who chooses the finalists.

If Woffinden was chosen as a finalist he would outscore the Peatys, and the bloke who spins around on a wooden horse, by the proverbial mile. The get to be a finalist in a tiny sport. Speedway as a sport is vastly bigger in every way. But that has no impact on who is picked.

The bbc is now obligated to shows the voting. Woffinden is more than capable of getter enough votes to make third with the amount of fans in the uk. They just won’t have the opportunity to vote for him.

I am a bit puzzled why you bundled up women’s sport as examples of sports that speedway is ‘huge’ in comparison to. You must have your reasons.

Women’s cricket is still in relatively formative stages, but netball and swimming are definitely comparative or bigger.

We can all throw out sweeping statements based on nothing but opinion. But without any facts to back it up, it’s nothing but noise. Then again, there’s a lot of it about these days..

Let’s take netball. How is speedway huge in comparison? Number of participants? League spectators? TV ratings? Social media followers? Sponsorship revenue? What are you basing it on?

Even the most rudimentary bit of internet research demonstrates netball compares favourably to speedway.

Just because we like speedway doesn’t make it relevant to the British public. That might be unpalatable, but it’s a fact.

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Think the name of the award is in older speech, as in the sports personality of the year, in today's abbreviated society would just be called "sports person of the year". Look at some of the great sportspeople that have won, who have had no personality at all.

 

On the minority sports, didn't some royal win it by making her horse walk around a sandy square. So minority sports can win as long as the beeb shows it.

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10 hours ago, falcace said:

I am a bit puzzled why you bundled up women’s sport as examples of sports that speedway is ‘huge’ in comparison to. You must have your reasons.

Women’s cricket is still in relatively formative stages, but netball and swimming are definitely comparative or bigger.

We can all throw out sweeping statements based on nothing but opinion. But without any facts to back it up, it’s nothing but noise. Then again, there’s a lot of it about these days..

Let’s take netball. How is speedway huge in comparison? Number of participants? League spectators? TV ratings? Social media followers? Sponsorship revenue? What are you basing it on?

Even the most rudimentary bit of internet research demonstrates netball compares favourably to speedway.

Just because we like speedway doesn’t make it relevant to the British public. That might be unpalatable, but it’s a fact.

The thing is though who decides what is relevant to the British public. I've no problem at all watching women in sport, atheletcs, tennis, cycling, swimming, gymnastics... Whatever. What I object to are the sports that are being force fed to us as part of a movement. It's quite clear that there is an agenda in certain quarters when you're getting women's version of certain sports (football & cricket especially) leading the sports headlines compared to the men's equivalent, despite playing in front of huge empty stadiums. Speedway already manages to do this without the help of the media

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BT Sport could always produce their own rival programme. But would Woffinden & Speedway get much of a chance? More than with Auntie, but they would just kowtow to those sports they pay the highest fees to! It's all a pointless irrelevance

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Some people really do need a little restraining. So what, speedway on the BBC? Now we're talking about Woffinden even getting a mention on SPOTY. The sport is at an all-time low. The Beeb did not want to know when it was at an all-time high and apparently did everything in their power to stop speedway winning the top prize, all the big big stars back then. What makes you think they'll change now when the sport is so void of character and genuine star names, that riders who would have never had a chance of being Champion are winning it like it were Scott Nicholls and his British Championship haul? I have slowly drifted away from speedway, not just in the UK, but globally. Be honest, speedway is the ugly boy in the class. Every so often he'll have an hair cut and hope the pretty girl in the corner will notice him.   

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8 hours ago, teaboy279 said:

Think the name of the award is in older speech, as in the sports personality of the year, in today's abbreviated society would just be called "sports person of the year". Look at some of the great sportspeople that have won, who have had no personality at all.

 

On the minority sports, didn't some royal win it by making her horse walk around a sandy square. So minority sports can win as long as the beeb shows it.

Fair do's :)

I'll give you that. Zara Phillips' winning was a joke. But a big portion of the blame falls on the public who go doe-eyed at the sight of a royal and duly voted based on her celebrity status. All we need to do is get Megan Markle on a Speedway Bike now... ;) 

The challenge for the BBC with SPOTY...and indeed everything else it does...is that it has to be all things to all people. Unlike other prominent media outlets which have a clear agenda beyond pure objectivity. The BBC has to take the wider view and although it isn't perfect, it does a pretty damn good job for what is an impossible task of trying to please all of the people all of the time.

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21 hours ago, Big Al said:

BT Sport could always produce their own rival programme. But would Woffinden & Speedway get much of a chance? More than with Auntie, but they would just kowtow to those sports they pay the highest fees to! It's all a pointless irrelevance

They do, Tai won alternative sports person of the year. Maybe 2015, but certainly before bt sports were showing speedway.

Edited by teaboy279
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On ‎9‎/‎25‎/‎2018 at 9:47 PM, falcace said:

I am a bit puzzled why you bundled up women’s sport as examples of sports that speedway is ‘huge’ in comparison to. You must have your reasons.

Women’s cricket is still in relatively formative stages, but netball and swimming are definitely comparative or bigger.

We can all throw out sweeping statements based on nothing but opinion. But without any facts to back it up, it’s nothing but noise. Then again, there’s a lot of it about these days..

Let’s take netball. How is speedway huge in comparison? Number of participants? League spectators? TV ratings? Social media followers? Sponsorship revenue? What are you basing it on?

Even the most rudimentary bit of internet research demonstrates netball compares favourably to speedway.

Just because we like speedway doesn’t make it relevant to the British public. That might be unpalatable, but it’s a fact.

Steve might have misplaced his comparisons here, but he's still right.

His point is that other minority sports get places on the Sports Personality of the Year, so there's no reason why speedway shouldn't (especially given Woffinden's likely unprecedented third world title). 

Its not a question of minority sport, its a question of whether that sport fits (for whatever reason) with the BBC. That's simply got to be wrong. 

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1 hour ago, Halifaxtiger said:

Steve might have misplaced his comparisons here, but he's still right.

His point is that other minority sports get places on the Sports Personality of the Year, so there's no reason why speedway shouldn't (especially given Woffinden's likely unprecedented third world title). 

Its not a question of minority sport, its a question of whether that sport fits (for whatever reason) with the BBC. That's simply got to be wrong. 

It's always been that way...

Its just become more obvious over the past couple of decades as satellite TV has taken over most of what the BBC used to show..

I believe they are taking steps this year to prevent the orchestrated block voting for minority sports after Rea came second last year..

If only we could get a British, blind, one armed, non binary, dwarf winning a British Speedway GP...

Winner, winner, chicken dinner...

:rolleyes:

Edited by mikebv
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15 hours ago, Halifaxtiger said:

Steve might have misplaced his comparisons here, but he's still right.

His point is that other minority sports get places on the Sports Personality of the Year, so there's no reason why speedway shouldn't (especially given Woffinden's likely unprecedented third world title). 

Its not a question of minority sport, its a question of whether that sport fits (for whatever reason) with the BBC. That's simply got to be wrong. 

So, he hasn't been able to substantiate the outlandish claims of how significant speedway is in comparison to other sports.  So, if you are also going to hop on that bandwagon, then at least try and bring something compelling to the table of a) why speedway is so significant b) the big BBC conspiracy against speedway.  Otherwise, again, its just baseless paranoia. Minority sports have been recognised when the achievement has been so great that it deserves recognition.  Jonathan Rea, Phil Taylor, Kevin Sinfield are three that spring to mind. 

The challenge for speedway is not only is it a niche sport among the wider sporting world, it's small fry in even just in a motorsport context. Think of it this way...imagine every sport is a mountain and the base is made up of those with a casual interest, then supporters up to recreational participants, local level competitors, up to national level up to continental level up to world level and the best in the world at the top. Guys like Lewis Hamilton, Mo Farah, Andy Murray and Anthony Joshua are - or have been - up at Everest levels. Tai Woffinden is atop Snowdon. 

As for the BBC bias, well I reckon the most likely contenders this year will be Geraint Thomas, Anthony Joshua, Lewis Hamilton and Dina Asher-Smith, all apart from Asher-Smith are predominantly featured on rival broadcaster's channels. See if I am wrong in December and you can justify your paranoia.

13 hours ago, mikebv said:

It's always been that way...

Its just become more obvious over the past couple of decades as satellite TV has taken over most of what the BBC used to show..

I believe they are taking steps this year to prevent the orchestrated block voting for minority sports after Rea came second last year..

If only we could get a British, blind, one armed, non binary, dwarf winning a British Speedway GP...

Winner, winner, chicken dinner...

:rolleyes:

I hardly ever, in fact never agree with the SPOTY top three. We're all biased. But my preference would be for it to go back to an experts panel to avoid some of the block voting that can skew the real picture. Some sports can rally their followers much easier than others. That's why guys like Tony McCoy have won it  - rightly or wrongly. It's probably true that if Tai Woffinden was shortlisted he probably would do quite well as I suspect speedway supporters would rally round. But that wouldn't make it a fair result. No matter what, horse racing fans will always vote for a jockey, petrol heads will always vote for an F1 driver and Scots will always vote for anyone Scottish. ;)

7 hours ago, Star Lady said:

You forgot female, gender neutral and ethnic minority.:P

Lesbian and a muslim immigrant too? How witty! I had forgotten all about those 70s sitcoms. Comedy gold!  I really must pick up a copy of the Mail and Sun tomorrow to take me back to those amusing times of ridiculing minorities and the notion of inclusivity. Happy days.

3 hours ago, BWitcher said:

And is a sexual assault survivor... i.e. a male touched her on the shoulder once in 1987.

Classy.

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2 hours ago, falcace said:

 

Lesbian and a muslim immigrant too? How witty! I had forgotten all about those 70s sitcoms. Comedy gold!  I really must pick up a copy of the Mail and Sun tomorrow to take me back to those amusing times of ridiculing minorities and the notion of inclusivity. Happy days.

Classy.



Not classy, truthful. I have said nothing against actual victims, just those celebrities who seek to usurp them with their own 'look at me' story.
 

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On 9/29/2018 at 10:27 PM, keepturningleft said:

Speedway mentioned on BBC1 Breakfast again this morning.

A bit of a non article to be honest re Polish rider getting tangled up with the tapes.

But at least we saw the incident.and a bit of chat about when Mike had a go.

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And from the BBC Sport site:

Director of BBC Sport Barbara Slater said: "BBC Sports Personality of the Year is a much-loved BBC show that is constantly evolving. Bringing in these changes allows us to celebrate even further what has been an incredible year of sport whilst also paying tribute to the achievements of individuals.

"Announcing the much-anticipated shortlist at the start of the show will add even another layer of excitement to what is set to be a thrilling night for everyone."

As has been discussed elsewhere on the forum this is arrant tosh. It is intended to restrict choice to those the BBC want and those only; no sports that they don't televise or regard as worthy of an award. If the BBC were honest about it, it might not be quite so bad, but to pretend it is for 'another layer of excitement' ....      It will take at least a fire hose to extinguish your pants Barbara! :nono:

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