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Killing the sport


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350 souls at Birmingham, the second city. If its not possible to get more people in, and double that crowd would still be pretty poor, then costs must be slashed. Its a double whammy, poor income, high outgoings. Is anyone winning in this situation?

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7 hours ago, ch958 said:

350 souls at Birmingham, the second city. If its not possible to get more people in, and double that crowd would still be pretty poor, then costs must be slashed. Its a double whammy, poor income, high outgoings. Is anyone winning in this situation?

The riders....

Two jobs and loads of guesting...

Kerching....

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On 6/22/2022 at 11:23 AM, ch958 said:

in reality, the situation is similar to the 6 team National league of the mid 60s. This resulted in the RAC appointing Lord Shawcross to come up with recommendations to ensure the survival, nothing less, of the sport.

Can the RAC be asked to intervene again to independently find a way forward?

His (Shawcoss) work lead to the formation of the British League (one big league!!) which prospered, led to a Division 2 which equally prospered and led further to a period of great success internationally and domestically.

The problems any such commission would face are quite different to those in the 60's(rapidly diminishing audience and environmental concerns for two) but would at least be independent and dispassionate.

The issue is exactly as you describe...

The "leadership" isn't either independent or dispassionate....

Even if large companies ever decided to sponsor Speedway, who negotiates?  

You can only imagine that whoever gets the job will have to shuttle back and too throughout the talks as they get commitment and agreement from others who will have wide and varied different agendas from one to another. ..

Ultimately we are at a point that doubling up is pretty much a given ongoing as riders will be used to two jobs' worth of income, with 50 to 60 meetings being what they expect/need, to earn the amount of cash that they see as acceptable. ..

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52 minutes ago, mikebv said:

The riders....

Two jobs and loads of guesting...

Kerching....

The days of the professional rider in British speedway is over, I warned a few years back this was happening offering various ideas at the time to address some of the issues we face on both sides of the fence but I was crucified by certain riders and their fan boys in the sport, until we accept the dire situation we are in the sport is doomed, I don’t claim to have the answers but you don’t need to be a fortune teller to see the dark days ahead, speedway is under pressure from external forces too but it’s main danger comes from within our sport 

Edited by THE DEAN MACHINE
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24 minutes ago, THE DEAN MACHINE said:

The days of the professional rider in British speedway is over, I warned a few years back this was happening offering various ideas at the time to address some of the issues we face on both sides of the fence but I was crucified by certain riders in the sport, until we accept the dire situation we are in the sport is doomed, I don’t claim to have the answers but you don’t need to be a fortune teller to see the dark days ahead, speedway is under pressure from external forces too but it’s main danger comes from within our sport 

Spot on

Death by a thousand self inflicted cuts...

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47 minutes ago, mikebv said:

The issue is exactly as you describe...

The "leadership" isn't either independent or dispassionate....

Even if large companies ever decided to sponsor Speedway, who negotiates?  

You can only imagine that whoever gets the job will have to shuttle back and too throughout the talks as they get commitment and agreement from others who will have wide and varied different agendas from one to another. ..

Ultimately we are at a point that doubling up is pretty much a given ongoing as riders will be used to two jobs' worth of income, with 50 to 60 meetings being what they expect/need, to earn the amount of cash that they see as acceptable. ..

John Berry put his name forward but soon realised that he wouldn't get the support of others within the sport and in a flash withdrew his interest.

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1 hour ago, mikebv said:

Even if large companies ever decided to sponsor Speedway, who negotiates?  

You can only imagine that whoever gets the job will have to shuttle back and too throughout the talks as they get commitment and agreement from others who will have wide and varied different agendas from one to another. ..

They get a Mr 50% man to do the negotiations for them!

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43 minutes ago, THE DEAN MACHINE said:

Last night at Sheffield showed the best and the worst of British speedway some decent racing and a close meeting and a couple of crashes to keep those who like that sort of thing entertained ,the rest well it was the very worst,

Brilliant summary. Doyle''s riding reminded me of why in the 70's I could get a car full to come up from Wolves most Thursdays to see who ever the opposition was. Frank Varey was my first and probably only tractor hero! 

As for the 'worst side' I'm sadly getting conditioned to it.

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2 hours ago, THE DEAN MACHINE said:

Last night at Sheffield showed the best and the worst of British speedway some decent racing and a close meeting and a couple of crashes to keep those who like that sort of thing entertained ,the rest well it was the very worst,

i would generally agree but reading Sheffield's announcement on FB I think we need to cut them some slack

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On 6/26/2022 at 5:16 PM, THE DEAN MACHINE said:

The days of the professional rider in British speedway is over, I warned a few years back this was happening offering various ideas at the time to address some of the issues we face on both sides of the fence but I was crucified by certain riders and their fan boys in the sport, until we accept the dire situation we are in the sport is doomed, I don’t claim to have the answers but you don’t need to be a fortune teller to see the dark days ahead, speedway is under pressure from external forces too but it’s main danger comes from within our sport 

I’m with you on this one. 
 

 

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1 hour ago, ch958 said:

i would generally agree but reading Sheffield's announcement on FB I think we need to cut them some slack

I think most of the frustration was the lack of information coming from Eurosport to the viewer, surely they could of sent Sam down there with a camera to see what the problem was. Not sure what info was given to the fans in the stadium though. Having read the statement, it does seem like a bit of a freak incident with an Apollo 13 style fix to get the meeting running again. I think most reasonable people can understand things like this can happen and genuinely can't be planned for... I spent an hour trying to get a screw out of the wall the other week, it would not budge, didn't matter what I did, had to drill it out in the end, sometimes the simplest of things just have you stumped

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On 6/17/2022 at 9:44 PM, Fina said:

If the lad is into other motorsport he will probably understand guests as Moto GP teams are obliged to find a replacement rider is one of their main riders is injured.  The team contract with Moto GP is to compete every round.

TBF, it's normally the test rider who'll get the ride as part of his contract. 

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