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Thrilled we've made the final . The updates were pretty biased , though it seems the ref in both meetings were happy to let things go at the starts . Personally if a rider doesn't break the tapes then all is good if he makes a good start . Leicester or Redcar to come , I'm really not bothered which one it is

Sorry you can't I'm afraid , your still a witch this year as well .

Which just shows a rider who is given a reserve spot with no pressure for a season, and a rider prepared to travel around the country picking up scraps week in week out, with many 0s whilst he hones his skills. Can really reep benefits the following season. I think the key thing now is that the young riders have had better schooling off of the track, and many have heads on thier shoulders well beyond thier years. I can think of about a dozen or so riders under the legal age of drinking that not only have the ability but also the mentality to reach the top. What British speedway should do is build from the bottom and build up speedway with this new breed of cool young kids making thier way up through the ranks.

Funny that, am pleased for the fans, particularly for that reason.

Pleased for the tigers fans , but still got a bitter taste from the "ban no ban" without explanation for cook .

I worked damn hard for it, having played a leading role in getting it televised from 1984. Having effectively two BSPAs at the time helped the situation. The British League couldn't accept an offer from Screen Sport to cover their league matches because they felt it would conflict with their deal for ITV's coverage of international events,. I lobbied hard for us to go for the NL instead and it paid off. Luckily our boss was Chris Fear, formerly with Westward TV, the ITV station for the south west who used to televise the odd event from Exeter. He knew that NL racing was just as watchable as the BL and as for lack of names our audience probably didn't know any names anyway. We went to the NL management committee and understandably they leapt at the chance. There was one technicality. The deal with ITV specified they were broadcast rights. We argued that at that dawn of cable and satellite (five years before the Sky multichannel service launched) we were not broadcasting but 'narrowcasting'. That won the day and we commenced weekly recorded match coverage plus open events recorded during the year to fill the close season until the ice racing coverage started in February. 52 weeks a year speedway was the result. I know strange things can happen in speedway. First you have to try. Within a year BL tracks were queueing up to join the NL, tempted by lower costs, a still high quality of racing and regular TV coverage. It grieves me to see today's speedway with pathetically short seasons for many. Back then if a track closed in September you knew they were in serious trouble and were likely to be goners. It was fun. It isn't now. How do we get back to enjoying ourselves? That 21 team NL meant that apart from the KO Cup and 4TT there were 20 losers. Now winning is all and anything that doesn't contribute to a possible league title is written off as meaningless. The fun's gone. Winning is far too important and if you try to make a meeting fun you'll probably get hit with a hefty misconduct fine from the BSPA/SCB for improper comment that would write off an entire season's fees or worse if you were doing it for free. At times it's hard not to despair. How DID we let that all go? Speedway - a great idea ruined.

Huge congratulations to the Tigers. A thoroughly deserved win. After the shock of Cookie losing out to Bomber and Rowe in Ht1,it was never an easy ride for Somerset after that. Razzers Ht13 ride to go round Bomber and inside Morris was fabulous. Both Kelvin and Nigel would have had a heart attack with the blistering speed. of it. Sensational ride. Despite 3 Tigers getting more warnings for starting than the local weather forecast, they never let the Rebels get away from them First time Ive seen Sam Jensen, very impressed. Now go finish the job and win the title.

The National League in the 80s reached 21 teams at one point. Goodness knows how we coped! (Well, we enjoyed every minute.....20 league matches plus KO Cup ties, 4TT qualifiers and a load of support meetings now cynically dismissed as 'meaningless') We were far too busy enjoying what we had. Tracks like Hackney used to stage over 30 meetings a season. Goodness knows how today's "Less is more" snowflakes would cope ;-)

The issue for finding a new "Brandon" is that you have to find a location suitable to have 40 add coaches running through a village when the stox are on, and finished. The current location is perfect. I went not long back and it's a mess but on what scale is expected to be refurbished too? The stands are good, the tracks still there and a few mobile bars and it's a start. It would need sizeable investment for lighting and the repair work for fencing then there is the electrics that have been ripped out of everywhere you can imagine. The land has opportunity for other local and community projects and trying to find land to build a new track on is a needle in a haystack. It will be intresting to see the response if any though from Brandon Estates. Where does this leave them? How far will they go before thinking lets just sell it and move onto another plot of land elsewhere. My saying all along is that they purchased a viable Motorsport stadium, not a housing estate to be. There must be easier and less challenging avenues for them to look at, save coventry speedway team have given them a fight they never expected and Jeff, David and co won't give up now ...Can't wait to get back and help tidy the old place up....

From Brian Burford's book, "Peter Craven The Wizard of Balance": "In what would prove to be his final season, Peter Craven seemed to be riding as well as ever. However, it was said that Peter wasn't very happy with the reduced number of meetings at Belle Vue, and he was considering a move. In the issue of Speedway Star dated 13 April, it says that Craven wanted a move because there were only scheduled to be twenty home meetings for club riders that year. In the following week's issue, Frank MacLean reported that the Aces' management had turned down his request. Norwich were said to be keen to engage his services if he did decide to leave the famous club. "Although Peter began the season with the Aces, the transfer saga eventually went into arbitration. A court of arbitration met in London where they heard the points of view expressed by both the Aces' manager Ken Sharples, and the rider. The court then ruled that it wasn't in the best interests of speedway that PC's request for a move south was granted. "There was also talk that he had planned to make the 1963 season his final one, and one source - who was close to Peter - revealed that it was felt he would make it his last year. After all, what was there to prove? "Talk of his possible retirement is given credibility when Brenda confirmed reports that he had been in negotiations with Charlie Oates about possibly buying his business from him.....John Gibson, who was a sports journalist for the local Edinburgh paper, said that Peter had confided in him when he was in the pits during that fateful night at the Old Meadowbank Stadium that he was considering buying a motorcycle business in the Lancashire area......The Manchester Evening News sports journalist, Duncan Measor, also said that Peter had confided in him that he was considering his future., "I believe that in a year or two I will have to think about another job. I never want to go on until I am a has-been", he told Measor."

Honestly Newcastle apart it wasn't very far away was it; (and not to blow ones trumpet too hard) I still haven't changed my mind and think it will be a Leicester/Glasgow final; although I would love to see our nearest and dearest in Redcar upset that form book and do it for north east speedway, however; and IMHO whatever the outcome it is building to be a good finale to the end of the season Regards THJ

I bagsy the Scarecrow , I was a Witch last year so that would be a nice change

You tell em Sam , I was starting to feel that Peter Craven was being overlooked on this thread. My take on the Wembley '62 final, (my first time there) is that Peter was an exceptionally popular winner for both fans and riders.

Agree Fogo are rapidly expanding but not really interested in the UK, as it’s predominantly a ‘stand by’ market. They have a UK Distributor but it’s very low volume. The real business is prime power and Aftermarket / Service territory . The majority of UK Genset manufacturers also focus on export.

Bickley last year was averaging well below 2 points a meeting at Worky before the last month of the season.He has probably nearly doubled his average at Championship level this year and has made progress

Ain't finished this season yet. And where have you been since Feb? Only recently started posting. Not another of the multi alias clown?

Aye, seems like that,,, according to the updates, it seems your lot had more rollers than Hilda Ogden.

No disrespect but Poles are highly unlikely to tune in to Eurosports possible UK coverage in great numbers given the amount of top level Speedway they get bombarded with each week, so I don't see how Polish companies will see a positive brand message for themselves by attaching their businesses to UK Speedway.. Bomber Harris v Charles Wright (for example) might mean something to us British fans but won't I would suggest inspire too many Poles to look in on match night.. I would think that Eurosports coverage in Poland would get a similar following like the saturated football coverage does over here for non league football.. eg Torquay v Chorley will get watched as you flick through for a while if nothing else is on, but not many other than the fans of those two teams will watch the whole match with any degree of interest as non league football is dwarfed by the Premiership and Champions League saturation.. And, as quoted often, the scheduling and production of Eurosport is often a shambles at times..

1. Kamil Brzozowski (Polska) 2. Kyle Howarth (Wielka Brytania) 3. Nikodem Bartoch (Polska) 4. Tim Sørensen (Dania) 5. Marcin Jędrzejewski (Polska) 6. Wadim Tarasienko (Rosja) 7. Andriej Kudriaszow (Rosja) 8. Andreas Lyager (Dania) 9. Brady Kurtz (Australia) 10. Sandro Wassermann (Niemcy) 11. Josh Grajczonek (Polska / Australia) 12. Jaimon Lidsey (Australia) 13. Ryan Douglas (Australia) 14. Dimitri Bergé (Francja) 15. Adrian Cyfer (Polska) 16. Mateusz Tonder (Polska)

I was a keen BV supporter before (and beyond) 1963, and BV rider, ob Duckworth, was a close friend of our family. Never heard anything about these rumours at all. PC was a favourite wherever he went, always a gentleman, always ready to talk to fans. I can well imagine fans of other teams wishing he was with them, but I reckon he was a BV man. Sadly it all ended too soon. Peter was patron of Wilmslow Hammers cycle speedway team (Manchester League). I joined Wilmslow in 1965 and proudly won the Peter Craven Memorial Trophy that year.

Saw that don't you just love unbiased updates, makes it all the sweeter.

The sadly missed speedway historian, Keith Farman, who was an absolutely devoted Ove Fundin fan, made a comprehensive study of all Ove's races. He found that although Fundin beat all his main rivals more times than they beat him, Craven was the one who beat him the most times.

Unless of course the respective stadia are used for something else on Saturdays?! (and Sundays for that matter.)

Mmmmm. Interesting Iris123 and thank you, indeed, food for thought. I have a question and its a pertinent one. Is this service available via one of the true wonders of the modern world, that is to say, the telephone, perchance? And if that it is indeed the case in point, do Messrs WHSmith accept postal orders as remittance (in part or full) for said purchases? Personally I cannot wait for the Internet to be invented whereby I can eagerly, and enthusiastically, look forward to the day companies decide to sell their wares "on-the-line", as I believe the correct parlance may well turn out to be.

.I like to see the bonus point back over two legs why that was dropped I never know lets be honest chapman saved the premiership this season cant see it happening again . one league must clearly be on the agenda .do I hold out of much progress im afraid no hoped to be proved wrong though