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Sheffield v Ipswich 27 June.


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23 minutes ago, geoff100 said:

I find it hard to believe than a tv producer on thousands a year in charge of a budget of millions thinks its a good idea to put"sam in his office",some of the bimbos sky used to have make him look good!

The ‘Sam in his office’ parts are embarrassing, may aswell go ask fans in the crowd some of there opinions of speedway in this country rather than watching Sam tell us this is a mechanic pouring fuel into a speedway bike…. Oh is it? Wouldn’t of guessed

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8 minutes ago, PhilTheAce said:

No, I agree. British speedway is harming itself. But that’s just us die hards that can see that. Eurosport are broadcasting it to the nation with a shambolic presentation team. And I imagine any newbies tuning in would turn off after 20 mins of Sam. 

Newbies wouldn't know who the heck he was anyway,   its only the so called die hards that know how bad he is,

When you also have a present day rider in Nicholls who is also the captain of his team doing commentary and not seemingly knowing the rules around the RS and heat 8 you know your in trouble

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2 hours ago, dontforgetthefueltapsbruv said:

You are a proper Charlie :rofl:

You post tells Eurosport that they need more input from those in charge on the night, if the viewing public had known about the 3 fencing panels being damaged, the fact that one is a panel attached to a gate that would've placated a few.

We needed talk about the track too, was it just the fact that it has dirt on that put riders off and why, was their ruts or was it the fact that the track men don't have enough time to keep a deep track smooth when the cameras are there, is every 4 heats enough, thinking back to Lynn, Huggy would grade after every hear to smooth out berms!

Maybe talk about the history of the airfences if we've got newbies watching, what was it like before airfences, both Kelv and Scotty could've done that?

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8 minutes ago, Trees said:

You post tells Eurosport that they need more input from those in charge on the night, if the viewing public had known about the 3 fencing panels being damaged, the fact that one is a panel attached to a gate that would've placated a few.

We needed talk about the track too, was it just the fact that it has dirt on that put riders off and why, was their ruts or was it the fact that the track men don't have enough time to keep a deep track smooth when the cameras are there, is every 4 heats enough, thinking back to Lynn, Huggy would grade after every hear to smooth out berms!

Maybe talk about the history of the airfences if we've got newbies watching, what was it like before airfences, both Kelv and Scotty could've done that?

Good point there.  With increasing scrutiny on the safety side of motorsports, often from people who are not fans but just see shocking headlines when things go badly wrong, the delay was an opportunity to explain to newer fans what speedway has done to improve this.  

Air fences are not perfect and do sometimes cause problems and frustrating delays, but they are a big step forward from nothing, or the straw bales that were widely used in road racing.

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It's a bit hysterical to suggest Sheffield should be deducted points for what happened last night. How much of it was under the direct control of the Sheffield promotion exactly? The TV coverage delayed the start of the meeting and there were numerous other occasions where a race was delayed to coincide with the coverage. There were a few situations where riders were having 2 consecutive rides, including one (I think it was around Heat 11 or 12 - I forget which) where the delay was interminable. We had a tape exclusion, three crashes, and of course one of those destroyed the air fence (hopefully Danny King is OK). 

That aside, there was actually some good racing last night and I saw a few of the kids who were standing on the 3rd / 4th bend - they were loving it. Nobody wanted the meeting to end like that last night - especially the Sheffield promotion who put a lot of effort into getting people into the stadium and who wanted to showcase the sport on TV - so to imply that they were time-wasting to deny Ipswich a bonus point, or that they should be deducted points for having a wrecked air-fence, is a bizarre interpretation of reality. 

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56 minutes ago, PhilTheAce said:

No, I agree. British speedway is harming itself. But that’s just us die hards that can see that. Eurosport are broadcasting it to the nation with a shambolic presentation team. And I imagine any newbies tuning in would turn off after 20 mins of Sam. 

The presentation on Eurosport is extremely poor, Sam has never been any good and Abbey is probably worse, bring back Rio, at least she knew about bikes and how to ride one fast. Kelvin is good but it was only Scotty that seemed to realise that Hume had replaced Batchelor!  I realise the air fence is there for safety but the delays were quite extreme with all the track staff seemingly not knowing how to fix the problem. It looked very poor and then after all the delays the curfew stops running the last two heats! So all the crowd hang around for a long long time and don't even get to see the last two heats , both of which would have had Doyley showing us how entertaining speedway can be.

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2 hours ago, HGould said:

Whatever the rights and wrongs of the issues last night, one thing seems to have been completely overlooked

RIDER SAFETY.

A weakness in any fence is as murphys law dictates like a magnet. 

Sheffield is one of the fastest tracks in the Country, phenominal speeds in to the bends and often in the high dirt line.

You CANNOT compromise that for TV, for the Public, it's the one aspect that is NON NEGOTIABLE.

We saw before air / foam fences how exposed lamposts and posts were a magnet, the losses of the likes of Gary Peterson; Denny Pyatt, Vic Harding to name but 3 sadly and forever missed and even with Air Fences riders have been badly hurt by Posts hit after going underneath or totally depressing the bag given the speed of impact.

Had that meeting continued with an ill-fitting or incorrectly fitted bag and someoe have been hurt or worse as a consequence then the raminfications would have been FAR MORE serious.

Maybe too before keyboard warriors and those who have never taken any responsibility for anything in their lives belittle and troll, may be consider the Track Staff and Track Volunteers who make speedy repairs 99 times out of 100 and always walking away with the responsibility of the repair they have ensured in their minds right the way through the meeting until the final race is run.

 

 

 

 

Agree with all of that,except an air fence tragically would have made no difference to the accident that cost poor Gary Peterson his life.He was caterpulted 6/7 feet in the air before crashing head first into a lamp standard.On saying that air/foam fences have saved numerous riders from serious injury,and I dread to think with the modern bikes that are now in use,what would happen if they weren't there.

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6 minutes ago, Mooose said:

It's a bit hysterical to suggest Sheffield should be deducted points for what happened last night. How much of it was under the direct control of the Sheffield promotion exactly? The TV coverage delayed the start of the meeting and there were numerous other occasions where a race was delayed to coincide with the coverage. There were a few situations where riders were having 2 consecutive rides, including one (I think it was around Heat 11 or 12 - I forget which) where the delay was interminable. We had a tape exclusion, three crashes, and of course one of those destroyed the air fence (hopefully Danny King is OK). 

That aside, there was actually some good racing last night and I saw a few of the kids who were standing on the 3rd / 4th bend - they were loving it. Nobody wanted the meeting to end like that last night - especially the Sheffield promotion who put a lot of effort into getting people into the stadium and who wanted to showcase the sport on TV - so to imply that they were time-wasting to deny Ipswich a bonus point, or that they should be deducted points for having a wrecked air-fence, is a bizarre interpretation of reality. 

The problem of riders taking consecutive heats was a major factor throughout the meeting:

Sedgman (heats 1 & 2); Mountain (heats 7 & 8); Howarth (heats 8 & 9); Musielak (heats 9 & 10); Riss (heats 9 & 10); Sedgman ( heats 11 & 12); Hume (heats 11 & 12) and Doyle (heats 13 & 14 - the one that never happened) all conspired to drag out the meeting and spoil what should have been a showpiece spectacle. As for the air fence, the number of times they take it down and put it up again after stock car meetings, one would have hoped they'd be fairly good at it by now.

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1 hour ago, geoff100 said:

U try stopping them gardening.

Poland seem to be able to...

2 minutes, tapes up, gone, (or out)..

One thing noticeable about last night was how quick RR can be actioned when the rider has two on the run..

Poland do it every week like this and dont need a curfew to make it happen like last night did..

2 minutes, tapes up, gone, (or out)..

No "extra time for two on the trot" like we have over here...

You want to "garden" in Poland then you had better get there early, because.. 

2 minutes, tapes up, gone, (or out)..

And they all set off in a straight line in Poland with the front wheel within a couple of inches of the tapes..

Not firing off at all angles after first rolling back when the start marshall walks away..

They do then seem to have a lot less "first bend incidents" off the back of it..

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11 minutes ago, Tommy Sweetman said:

Agree with all of that,except an air fence tragically would have made no difference to the accident that cost poor Gary Peterson his life.He was caterpulted 6/7 feet in the air before crashing head first into a lamp standard.On saying that air/foam fences have saved numerous riders from serious injury,and I dread to think with the modern bikes that are now in use,what would happen if they weren't there.

Moving the floodlights would have. But it would have been too expensive so they were left in place. That cost Denny Pyeatt his life and it was only after Craig Featherby hit a lamp standard at Peterborough that the safety standards were changed for the better.

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2 hours ago, HGould said:

Whatever the rights and wrongs of the issues last night, one thing seems to have been completely overlooked

RIDER SAFETY.

A weakness in any fence is as murphys law dictates like a magnet. 

Sheffield is one of the fastest tracks in the Country, phenominal speeds in to the bends and often in the high dirt line.

You CANNOT compromise that for TV, for the Public, it's the one aspect that is NON NEGOTIABLE.

We saw before air / foam fences how exposed lamposts and posts were a magnet, the losses of the likes of Gary Peterson; Denny Pyatt, Vic Harding to name but 3 sadly and forever missed and even with Air Fences riders have been badly hurt by Posts hit after going underneath or totally depressing the bag given the speed of impact.

Had that meeting continued with an ill-fitting or incorrectly fitted bag and someoe have been hurt or worse as a consequence then the raminfications would have been FAR MORE serious.

Maybe too before keyboard warriors and those who have never taken any responsibility for anything in their lives belittle and troll, may be consider the Track Staff and Track Volunteers who make speedy repairs 99 times out of 100 and always walking away with the responsibility of the repair they have ensured in their minds right the way through the meeting until the final race is run.

 

 

 

 

As at least one other poster has said, Eurosport should have switched to informing the viewers about the role air fences play in rider safety, and how sometimes fixing them isn't a straightforward matter. This could have been done by Tatum and Nicholas instead viewers were treated to semi-coherent Sam and Abby from the crèche. It was only when Chris Louis came to the rescue that any semblance of order was restored, but again, they could have asked him to talk about rider safety.

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14 minutes ago, mikebv said:

Poland seem to be able to...

2 minutes, tapes up, gone, (or out)..

One thing noticeable about last night was how quick RR can be actioned when the rider has two on the run..

Poland do it every week like this and dont need a curfew to make it happen like last night did..

2 minutes, tapes up, gone, (or out)..

No "extra time for two on the trot" like we have over here...

You want to "garden" in Poland then you had better get there early, because.. 

2 minutes, tapes up, gone, (or out)..

And they all set off in a straight line in Poland with the front wheel within a couple of inches of the tapes..

Not firing off at all angles after first rolling back when the start marshall walks away..

They do then seem to have a lot less "first bend incidents" off the back of it..

The Polish tracks are huge compared to ours which helps stop first bend incidents, it's probs why they don't garden as much either as there are loads more options going into and out if the first/second bend?

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Can't quite understand the criticisms of the presenters with the very obvious exception of one of them

Tatum, Louis & Nicholls are all excellent and although Abi presumably isn't a 'speedway person', she is never the less quite appealing and engaging and has obviously done all her home work.

Sam however is simply beyond belief. Seriously, my 5 year old granddaughter has a greater grasp of the English language than this man.

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5 hours ago, foreverblue said:

The way he is riding would improve any team. He is going to get Alot of guest bookings 

Chris Harris might have something to say about that

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1 hour ago, Trees said:

The Polish tracks are huge compared to ours which helps stop first bend incidents, it's probs why they don't garden as much either as there are loads more options going into and out if the first/second bend?

Someone must have told you that fact :) If Kings Lynn rode in Poland i could understand you knowing. :D

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Something else which didn't escape my attention last night was the amount of shale on the track - probably more than I've ever seen in 57 years. It was also noted that there were three quite serious pile-ups which, if memory serves, is more than we've had in the entire season up to now. Can the two facts be related?

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When I went to Owlerton for the Wolves match recently there were issues with the track early on which they had several goes at sorting out before an extended grade after heat 6 finally sorted it and it was fine thereafter and there was some excellent racing

Perhaps Sheffield need to review their track prep 

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22 minutes ago, 4thbender said:

Something else which didn't escape my attention last night was the amount of shale on the track - probably more than I've ever seen in 57 years. It was also noted that there were three quite serious pile-ups which, if memory serves, is more than we've had in the entire season up to now. Can the two facts be related?

Kelvin did mention how deep the outside was before the meeting using his "dirtometer" and how on bends three and four in particular it can "pull you in" at Owlerton..

The dirt line certainly moved out and the racing certainly benefited off the back of it..

A very fine line between safety and entertainment in Speedway..

Which is probably why it can be so great to watch.. 

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6 hours ago, Charlieboy said:

Well there seems to be a lot of bed wetting in Ipswich and a lot of finger pointing. Last nights meeting would have been better obviously without the delays BUT when Eurosport come to the stadium they dictate what happens. Last night the raffle girls couldn’t go on the centre green to make the draw and none of the corporate lot where aloud on either. The start of the meeting is always delayed because of ads and interviews etc. The next delay was heat 2 when broc Nicol stuffed mountain in the fence and got away with it. All the delays were explained by the centre green announcer but for all the armchair fans who weren’t there they wouldn’t know it was been held up by Eurosport. Then we had the Danny king incident which affected 3 panels not just the one he hit. Unfortunately one was the panel covering the gate and the vaulenteer track staff had problems with this repair. Probably if the Ipswich supporters who know all about air fences had turned up to support their team they could have advised on the repair. The meeting was then hurried along by Eurosport only for another Ipswich rider to hit the air fence and more time wasted. Sheffield have had a curfew for years and many people are aware of this because of local housing and a very strict council so we have to live with it. In between the delays I thought there was some decent racing and without the delays a lot of comments on here would have been a lot different. I think Ipswich probably deserved a point and might have achieved it in heat 15. So for all those who couldn’t be bothered to turn up but just enjoy moaning I would suggest pick up your remote and turn the speedway off and put love island on and watch a load of talentless people getting more money that riders risking their lives for your entertainment. 

absolutely spot on!

* Owlerton is in the suburb of HILLSBOROUGH,since that tragedy both stadiums (on the same road) have been made to stick to ALL H&S aspects to the letter of the law,no room for manouvre or they're shut down! (other stadiums would not be able to function if they were in sheffield, it's a price both clubs have had to pay to this day and won't ever change.

*  the volunteer track workers do NOT have degrees in 'air fence engineering' they are unpaid ,hard working volunteers who do it to keep their club running

* ruts in the track due to stock cars (who share the stadium with greyhounds also), the volunteers get about 6 hours a week to do all the prep work (usually wed. night) .speedway does not own the stadium and are probably last in the pecking order 

* housing estates are up the hill on the back straight 

*it was a complete one-off ... never seen curfew at owlerton before (what a time to choose)!  

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