norbold

Buster Frogley was Wembley captain in 1930, but, by the end of July, was actually their worst rider in terms of averages, causing him to resign as captain.

As some of you know I was named after a speedway rider, Wimbledon captain, Norman Parker, and the first team I supported was New Cross. Yesterday, while sorting through some of my old Speedway papers, I came across a copy of Speedway World which included the results for the week I was born, so I looked up what matches were on the day I was born. By an odd coincidence, the only match on that day was Wimbledon v. New Cross, with Wimbledon winning 52-43, Norman Parker scoring 12 points. Sorry, I'll get back to my hole.

For being a fraud of course.

I was at the meeting as well and still have my programme. Sadly, I seem to have missed the significance of what happened as all I have written in my programme is e/f for Olsen!

Ginger Lees rode for Burnley in 1929, but they packed up in June, after (I think) only five meetings. With no English track, he took himself off to ride, as you say, in Germany and Denmark.

Just for completeness, here are the rest of the top averages in Peter Jackson's post-War stats: 1946: Eric Langton 11.13 1947: Vic Duggan 11.75 1948: Vic Duggan 11.47 1949: Vic Duggan 10.65 1950: Graham Warren 10.45 1951: Aub Lawson 10.31 1952: Ronnie Moore 11.36 1953: Jack Young 10.61 1954: Ronnie Moore 10.59 1955: Ronnie Moore 10.86 1956: Barry Briggs 10.53 1957: Peter Craven 11.14

Yes, sorry, I meant to say, but it was getting late! It has been converted to 3-2-1.

1933: 9.79; 1934: 10.26; 1935: 8.74; 1936: 9.95; 1937: 10.73; 1938: 8.13; 1939: 10.44; 1946: 11.57 Those are Langton's home averages only.

Re- of and have, I agree with chunky. I know languages evolve over time, but the use of of instead of have is just plain wrong. As far as the use of the word bottle goes, it has been in common usage at least in the East End for as long as I can remember. Back in the 1960s, when a rider was behind in a race and packed up, we often used to write in the programme "bottle gone" instead of e/f or d.n.f.

Just out of interest, after mentioning Peter Jackson's averages on another thread, I thought I'd just take a look at who topped the averages in the pre-War years (1933-1939). 1933: Jack Parker 10.33, 1934: Vic Huxley: 10.31, 1935: Bluey Wilkinson 10.57, 1936: Jack Parker 10.27, 1937: Jack Milne 11.09, 1938: Jack Milne 10.96, 1939: Cordy Milne 11.50 (The 1939 season was unfinished of course).

As far as I can see, Peter has used a full set of results for 1933-1957. His averages are only First Division though.

Well, you did get an honourable mention in my little diatribe above...

It is fun of course and I love doing it as much as anyone, but it really is an impossible job. The more time goes on the more older greats are forgotten. What the "greatest" really means for most people is the greatest you have experience of. How many these days would put Vic Huxley or Frank Arthur in their top 10? In fact, the only pre-War rider who even gets a mention these days is Tom Farndon and that's only me (and chunky!) What about Bluey Wilkinson, Eric Langton, the Milne Brothers, Lionel Van Praag and so on and so on? There is no-one around now who has any real knowledge of them at their peak, so no-one can really compare them. It's only with Jack Young and the Big Five we begin to get actual memories and, over time, those memories will fade too. "The Greatest" is a movable feast.

So, if you had eight riders on eight points, you would have to have two semi-finals and a final to decide the winner. That sounds like a really ridiculous way of deciding the winner of an individual meeting....oh, hang on a minute....

Peter Jackson compiled complete averages for the years 1933-1957 (at least, as they are the one I have). They have all been converted to the common four ride average system we use today.