GRAND PRIX CHALLENGE

[Barrow Boy 2]

This meeting is too cutthroat. It contains some of the best riders in the world all trying to get into the GPs. One bad ride early on makes them desperate. Would it not be better and safer if such an important meeting had semi finals and a final. This would give all riders more chances to keep an interest in the meeting therefore not making them so desperate.

[Fromafar]

6 minutes ago, Barrow Boy 2 said:

This meeting is too cutthroat. It contains some of the best riders in the world all trying to get into the GPs. One bad ride early on makes them desperate. Would it not be better and safer if such an important meeting had semi finals and a final. This would give all riders more chances to keep an interest in the meeting therefore not making them so desperate.

Just don’t see what all the fuss is about.It was just another meeting the track was good ,the racing was decent,unfortunately the riders that fell got nasty injuries,simple looking falls just bad luck with the injuries ,could happen every week at a track near you. That’s the nature of the Sport. Total rubbish being spouted about the safety fence.

[wtf]

18 hours ago, OveFundinFan said:

Re Thomson, I wonder if the fence had been a pukka air fence rather than foam his leg injury would have not been as bad.

The truth is you'll never know. There are plenty of occasions where air fences have lifted and caused much bigger injuries than a poly-foam fence. Chris Holder's career was effectively ruined by one in 2013. So each fence has it's merits, and it's downsides. The FIM approval procedure is, I would suggest, considerably more involved and scientific, than some of the numbskulls on here and on Twitter. A safety fence cannot eliminate injuries. It helps to prevent them or minimise them. If any rider and some do, choose to take such a big risk, that they'll end up in the fence and expect to walk away, then I would say they are misguided. The inclusion of body armour, air jackets, air fences etc have made the sport so much safer, but some do seem to expect to have a right to walk away from any crash.

I think the overall upshot from Saturday will be ( and I hope not) a move to have such meetings on a more traditional track, which can provide much less of a challenge to some of the leg trailing throttle jockies we seem to have bred. 

Edited August 22, 2022 by wtf

[racers and royals]

39 minutes ago, wtf said:

The truth is you'll never know. There are plenty of occasions where air fences have lifted and caused much bigger injuries than a poly-foam fence. Chris Holder's career was effectively ruined by one in 2013. So each fence has it's merits, and it's downsides. The FIM approval procedure is, I would suggest, considerably more involved and scientific, than some of the numbskulls on here and on Twitter. A safety fence cannot eliminate injuries. It helps to prevent them or minimise them. If any rider and some do, chooses to take a such a big risk that they'll end up in the fence and expect to walk away, then I would say they are misguided. The inclusion of body armour, air jackets, air fences etc have made the sport so much safer, but some do seem to expect to have a right to walk away from any crash.

I think the overall upshot from Saturday will be ( and I hope not) a move to have such meetings on a more traditional track, which can provide much less of a challenge to some of the leg trailing throttle jockies we seem to have bred. 

As it’s called the challenge then  i  think Glasgow is fine- I certainly are happier with it there than at places like Zarnovica, Gorican or Krsko.(Daugavpils would be good if prepared right).

Edited August 22, 2022 by racers and royals

[topaz325]

OK, here are my views on the meeting.

Arrived just after six and the place was packed with fans, the entry to the stadium was done with the usual Glasgow efficiency, tickets checked, programme bought, 50/50 bought, and drink purchased on entry all within a few minutes.

The parade was started at around 7pm , in hindsight maybe the parade should have started at 6:50pm.

The racing was fantastic and for what it's worth I thought the track was fine.

The crashes which took place were on the face of it did not look serious but did cause some nasty injuries to the riders and although it was a long drawn-out meeting for the fans the rider's safety must be paramount and the utmost care must be taken to tend to the riders injuries.

When the sun went down it did get cold and did not help when standing around for over four hours.

We had to leave before the end to get transport back into the city and so missed the last three or four heats...

A great gesture by the winner of the 50/50 draw (£525) to donate it to the children's cancer hospital which was matched by the promoters.

Edited August 22, 2022 by topaz325

[OveFundinFan]

6 hours ago, Barrow Boy 2 said:

This meeting is too cutthroat. It contains some of the best riders in the world all trying to get into the GPs. One bad ride early on makes them desperate. Would it not be better and safer if such an important meeting had semi finals and a final. This would give all riders more chances to keep an interest in the meeting therefore not making them so desperate.

It’s just like the old world championship and all it’s sub rounds used to be, you perform or your out.

[chunky]

1 hour ago, OveFundinFan said:

It’s just like the old world championship and all it’s sub rounds used to be, you perform or your out.

Exactly what I was thinking...

[OveFundinFan]

8 hours ago, Barrow Boy 2 said:

This meeting is too cutthroat. It contains some of the best riders in the world all trying to get into the GPs. One bad ride early on makes them desperate. Would it not be better and safer if such an important meeting had semi finals and a final. This would give all riders more chances to keep an interest in the meeting therefore not making them so desperate.

Adding to my other comment, you can have two semis and a final but then you simply make 8 riders, reducing to four, fight for the 3 places in next years GP. You cannot get round the fact there are winners and losers.  

[Chris]

Some cracking racing second half of the meeting. Nothing wrong with the track and didn't cause any of the injuries.

That safety fence doesn't look right at all. Zero give in it and Thomsen's bike flew 30 foot down the straight when it bounced off it. No wonder he ended up with a compound fracture going in feet first.

[gmarsbar2]

On 8/21/2022 at 9:27 AM, glenantony said:

If this was the worst meeting at Glasgow you must see some fantastic meetings! Some of the best speedway I have seen for years  

Loved my first visit to Ashfield- the racing was exciting and at times unpredictable. As someone said there wasn’t much complaining at the track as people were respectfully waiting for the injured riders to be cared for.

Some riders obviously found the track difficult but that is surely down to their own way of riding and certainly the Poles struggled with the shape - that doesn’t make the track poor, it just means there is more to speedway than open the throttle and go. 

We are spoilt with the quality of racing at Glasgow, unfortunately there is no streaming this season except from BSN, so unless you attend you aren't going to see the fantastic racing served up on a weekly basis. For some reason BSN chose to cover the totally uncompetitive Newcastle fixture in April which was  actually the worst meeting of the season.

However for all the hype about world class riders coming to Glasgow around a third of the riders couldn't race on the track. They looked fast in a straight line on their expensively tuned to the max engines but couldn't navigate the bends hence the numerous 60 second race times. Which are a rarity in Championship meetings.

The cutthroat nature of the meeting lead to numerous crashes, nothing to do with the track or the fence. 

No problem with the long delays while Anders and Chris were being treated on track, the medical staff should get at much time as needed, they do a great job. 

But I don't think the Polish referee pushed the meeting through at the usual GP pace. What's polish for curfew?

4 hours on the couch watching a stream might be fine but some were standing at the track for much longer.

[PolskiZuzel]

On 8/20/2022 at 11:49 PM, Steve Shovlar said:

Nowhere near GP rider quality. Be as bad or worse than Bertzon. Appalling qualifier.

So have it your way...what that would be? ...

[PolskiZuzel]

On 8/21/2022 at 7:30 PM, davie10 said:

.... if that was an air fence it might have been a different story 

 

If my grandmother had a mustache, she could be my grandfather 

[arnieg]

I see crowd reported as 1931. 

 

No wonder the sport gets so little publicity. (South Shields in the Northern Premier League [tier 7] averaged more than that last year)

[Fromafar]

6 hours ago, arnieg said:

I see crowd reported as 1931. 

 

No wonder the sport gets so little publicity. (South Shields in the Northern Premier League [tier 7] averaged more than that last year)

What’s football got to do with speedway.

Ive never heard of South Shields Football Club what kind of publicity do they get since that seems to be the subject .

 

[jimmy jimmy]

I was surprised at the crowd size, the PC Memorial at BV got 1,000 more than that. With Bewley and Lambert et al would have expected more, but I don’t know what the capacity at Glasgow is? 

[glenantony]

Seemed like a healthy crowd to me - I hope Glasgow Speedway made some money as their facilities and organisation were excellent.

Why do members of this forum feel such a need to talk the sport down? 

The track, the fence, the delays, the coverage, the crowd, the time of the races, the format, the winner of the meeting for god's sake - all been panned in the preceding 40 pages, much by the keyboard experts who sat and watched a stream. 

How about taking the positives and advocating this great sport. I count myself lucky to have seen that meeting on my first visit to Glasgow and also thoroughly enjoyed my first visit to Edinburgh the previous night. Both clubs seem well run with good tracks and consequently well supported - isn't that what we all want?

Sometimes it seems that the forum members hate the sport and look forward to it's total demise just to say 'I knew that would happen' - c'mon try loving the sport as it is!

[gmarsbar2]

1 hour ago, jimmy jimmy said:

I was surprised at the crowd size, the PC Memorial at BV got 1,000 more than that. With Bewley and Lambert et al would have expected more, but I don’t know what the capacity at Glasgow is? 

There was a national train strike, I'm sure that had an effect on the attendance.

Plus there was a stream available, why travel hundreds of miles when you can watch from home? Took me a day to recover from going to Redcar on Sunday and I wasn't even driving!

[Tinker]

2 hours ago, glenantony said:

Seemed like a healthy crowd to me - I hope Glasgow Speedway made some money as their facilities and organisation were excellent.

Why do members of this forum feel such a need to talk the sport down? 

The track, the fence, the delays, the coverage, the crowd, the time of the races, the format, the winner of the meeting for god's sake - all been panned in the preceding 40 pages, much by the keyboard experts who sat and watched a stream. 

How about taking the positives and advocating this great sport. I count myself lucky to have seen that meeting on my first visit to Glasgow and also thoroughly enjoyed my first visit to Edinburgh the previous night. Both clubs seem well run with good tracks and consequently well supported - isn't that what we all want?

Sometimes it seems that the forum members hate the sport and look forward to it's total demise just to say 'I knew that would happen' - c'mon try loving the sport as it is!

Here here! I was there too, my first visit to Glasgow. Good enthusiastic crowd, good organisation (entry, stewards etc) and lots of exciting racing, thrills and spills. Unfortunate that riders were injured and this was the only downside. 

Loved the way you could stroll right into the pits before the meeting and be up close with the riders. How many other tracks allow you to do that?

Well done Glasgow!

[Shockster]

18 hours ago, Tinker said:

Here here! I was there too, my first visit to Glasgow. Good enthusiastic crowd, good organisation (entry, stewards etc) and lots of exciting racing, thrills and spills. Unfortunate that riders were injured and this was the only downside. 

Loved the way you could stroll right into the pits before the meeting and be up close with the riders. How many other tracks allow you to do that?

Well done Glasgow!

Spot on.  My first visit there too.  Fair hike up from Halifax.  Stayed in Glasgow Friday and Saturday and had a great time.  Enjoyed talking to the locals at the track and hope to visit again.  Hope Anders and Chris recover quickly. 

[topaz325]

1 hour ago, Shockster said:

Spot on.  My first visit there too.  Fair hike up from Halifax.  Stayed in Glasgow Friday and Saturday and had a great time.  Enjoyed talking to the locals at the track and hope to visit again.  Hope Anders and Chris recover quickly. 

And the big Red bus