Leaderboard

No, it's about having teams of relatively equal strength so that you don't have a race to financial extinction for those who cannot compete economically. It's a case of not having the insanity of paying highly expensive 'star' riders blasting round half a lap in front and taking home more than the total attendance money. Sadly too many fans hide behind the "watered down" mantra that totally fails to realise that the sport in Britain is a brown ale sport trying to live off champagne. Yes, there was a day when we could afford the top talent but those costs have been disastrously escalated by the money being paid in Poland and riders' expectations soaring as a result. The bubble will burst but for now Britain has to find a way to survive until then and if it does not then find a way to survive. Having fans that see that the quality of racing is vastly more important that the quality of names in a sport like ours might help. At this level it's all about putting on meetings that will attract and entertain new crowds, not provide them with uncompetitive meetings but telling them,"Who cares, that's Tai Woffinden half a lap ahead of Jason Doyle". Most would say "Who the hell are they and why is there no action?". British speedway's situation cannot be simplistically laid entirely at the BSPA's door. The competition of Poland and the Grand Prixs have battered British speedway which never stood a chance. When the sport here tries to do something to survive it would be useful if these posturing 'supporters' actually demonstrated that support by dropping this damaging "watered down" rubbish, but then that would ask for a view of the bigger picture that too many cannot or will not even begin to try. This will be my 47th season in the sport and in those years I have watched speedway and often worked in it all levels from World Finals to training tracks. Thankfully I've learned that I was just as likely to see a decent speedway race at Iwade as I would be at Cardiff of Wembley. I would have missed so much joy if I had stupidly stuck to the "I don't DO second division" or "It's watered down" approach. In most sports the greater the talent the greater the entertainment, but that doesn't work in racing unless you have the enormous hype budget of F1. I adore the sight of a match being won by a rider bravely taking the outside line to win on the line and I don't care what his name or reputation is....

But you clearly said “hope he gets as mush stick as CH did” you knew CH got a lot of stick, so you are hoping CC gets the same treatment. If you didn’t mean that you should word you posts more clear. I for one didn’t know the history behind your comment.

No... We're hanging on till March as there are so many riders getting their averages re assessed and rules being reviewed and re-reviewed we might by then be able to put last years team out under 40 points..!!!

Sad to see the passing of odd fossengen many a supporters idol in years gone by

They will give him whatever average they want as there are some very strange averages going about for the new season. Clegg only rode 4 matches for a 2 point average, which our glorious governing body have kept for him. Think it depends who you are, who you ride for and who asks. Seems to be even less logic than the farce of 2017.

Good luck Craig for your first GP campaign i for one will be cheering him on.

The major difference of course is that in Poland they cheer on 'their team' not a cobbled together, for one night only, randomly selected collection of riders out to earn an extra pay night through guesting.... In this day and age, it is asking for an enormous leap of faith to expect fans to buy into team Speedway over here when invariably it is a very tenuous link to actually being 'your team'... Some can be complicit in this deception, ignore or suspend reality, and convince themselves that they are watching the team they have built up and invested such emotional loyalty in.... Sadly these people are very much in the minority and general Sports followers (and indeed many Speedway fans of long standing) will struggle to take what gets served up as a 'professional sport' seriously... Here's hoping fixed race nights brings the Leagues some much needed credibility and integrity.. Bottom line is if any professional sporting competition ends up being so contrived it isn't actually worth winning, then there comes a point when fan attendance isnt actually worth doing either.. Who knows, maybe a new dawn in 2018!! Let's hope so....

Do what they do at Belle Vue and stream the press conference on Facebook. That enables those of us who have a long journey home to watch it when we get home or the next day.

Neither should get stick, people have a choice of either getting involved or not, moaning about it shouldn't need to be an option. Good luck to Cook for 2018. And Bomber for that matter.

They'd best not sign Kus then.

Glad you clarified. I had a feeling you were not knocking Cook but pointing out how Harris was treated. And, of course, my best wishes to Craig in the GP series.

I will be looking forward to the Fen Tigers results in 2018, however I would like to see Robert Henry persuaded to stay on-board & oversee/advise the young team @ home meetings & Kevin Jolly likewise for away meetings. This in no way to undermine Phil? Kirk position as the team manager. It would be great & justified for success to come Mildenhalls way in 2018 & hats off to Kevin Jolly in supporting Jon Armstrong's testimonial meeting - how about a 4 team event representing Mildenhall, Ipswitch, Kings Lynn & Peterborough? picking the right date the most important thing.

A very happy new year to all my fellow posters on here especially my Somerset mates whom I hope to catch up with next season. World Champion at #No 1 for us, we’ve come a long way baby.

Heres hoping 2018 is the year of the Witch

Think Hans would be great for you guys. Is a good team leader. And if KP gets used to the UK he will easily be your 2nd heat leader with the talent he has displayed. King as a 4th rider would be a huge advantage. And with Newman hopefully finally getting it all sorted really good go far.

I very much doubt you could write the rules of most sports on a sheet of paper (unless it was a very large sheet and writing was very small), especially a sport that caters for multiple formats. 'Tear up the rulebook' is just one of those silly mantras that gets bandied about by speedway people, and you of all people should know better than to repeat that. Whether or not there should be points limits, guests, averages and the like is one debate, but whilst they're deemed to be necessary by the sport, then there's always going to need to be a degree of complexity in the regulations. If there was nothing written down about these things, it would be total chaos and even more open to ad-hoc and biased decision-making. 'Four riders doing four laps' would frankly get pretty boring pretty quickly if there wasn't any structure to it. That's why the sport quickly evolved from ad-hoc scratch races to team events. And in reality, it's really only the team building stuff and certain technical elements that are highly contentious. The rest of the rulebook, whilst it might be better written, isn't controversial.

You most definitely do have tunnel vision - I admire your dedication to the club I cannot fault you on that but just sometime even you must leave the stadium and doubt your dedication.to the club .

Apologies I was having an unusually upbeat day (Not sure what was wrong with me). I am delighted that Pipe has stopped dragging Buxton down from the inside but fearful where he will end up next.

Why would they even consider riding in a league that is doing its damnest to get rid of them anyway? Zagar had already said he was looking to ride here next year and they came up with a couple of rules that effectively put a stop to it.

Tell that to Cradley fans.

Hope he gets as much stick as Chris Harris did when he tried to raise some funds

Instead of getting the fighty bird to kick the tuna buttys off tai’s head why not get the soccer player to do a full throttle practice start on a speedway bike in the studio , that would of been pure entertainment

Why would you lie directly to there faces!!!

I believe the plan was to have both if what I'm told was right - and like SCB, I've no reason to doubt it. Matt Ford demanding that we buy Holder was scuppered that.

By only allowing one over eight point rider you have prevented more top riders coming back to British league and in doing so watered down the standard of the riders in the league. Other thing to change is the dropping the double point rule,good move the tac sub rule is a better option.I wrote to the B S P A last year asking for this to be done, But i also wanted to make it more interesting so team managers would have more to think about by adding a twist to tac sub rule. If a rider is nominated to take a tac sub ride he could then not be allowed to ride in heat fifteen it would make team managers have to use there skills when making decisions on who to use and who to save fof heat fifteen. thus making team managers job much more interesting i lost interest in being a manager because of a lack of any decision making only a stupid black and white hat.Of course there is more to team managing like knowing how to deal with riders ,how to motivate riders some you have to shout at and others you have to treat differently to get a reaction ,anyway hope someone agrees with my ideas