E I Addio

What happened then ? I never saw Arne Ride but obviously his accident was well known. I never knew anyone else was involved.

Don’t recognise the faces, maybe a bit before my time but I remember racing at Rayners Park which was just like the video in that they were all men driving up in their own cars and we were still at school , aged around 15. Right bunch of posers they were too, never had the bottle to graduate to proper motorcycle sport but able to whop teams of school boys. Tolworth Tudors were even worse. They were great days and I enjoyed them but I got fed up with being knocked off by men poncing around in what was basically a schoolboy sport. Most teams were pretty equal though , especially around East London.

The biggest attendance ever is generally regarded as the ‘73 WF at Katowice , estimated at 130,000.

Just checked. He did actually make two WF’s in 73 and 77. He also did a number of World Pairs and Team cups.

Martin Piddock and Peter Bradshaw . Two massive talents taken from us in the Lokkoren disaster. How Bob Kilby never made a World Final I shall never know. Not sure if John Boulger made one but he should have done. Ivor Brown was a hard man who was possibly on the cusp of big things before he was seriously injured. By and large though, I think under the old style single WF most who should have made it got there at least once as opposed the the GP system where for some it depends on whether your face fits.

I feel the same. Not just the loss of Lakeside but the way it was done , along with Worky and Rye House stitched up by the BSPA, Godfrey in particular along with the loss of others, especially Coventry I miss going to.. I hope to motivate myself to go to Ipswich when Wolves are there , just to see Richard Lawson and Nick Morris, but who knows. I've been going to speedway all my life and I never ever thought I would feel like this, but the current numpties in charge have totally tarnished it for me.

The Sverre Harrfeldt thread got a bit side tracked by a discussion about Christer Loftqvist andReidar Eide so rather than spoil that thread I thought I would start a separate one as both were involved in two of the most memorable races I have ever seen. I say memorable rather than great because we can have different opinions on what is a great race but sometimes you see a race or races that just seem to define everything you love about speedway. The two races in question took place in a West Ham v Wembley match 13th October 1970 . There was a great build up to them . Reidar went out and won heat one over a second faster than anyone else rode that night, and inflicted Olle Nygrens only defeat of the evening. He was back out in heat 5 and whopped Tony Clarke and Barry Crowson. Two heats later he came out on a tac sub to beat Christer Loftqvist. He was looking invincible and the fans resigned themselves to him going through the card. Then came a fabulous heat 11 , when Loftqvist and Eide were programmed against each other. Reidar made the gate (just) but with Christer scraping the fence as only he could , he slowly edged in front , but with barely half a bikes length lead he locked up sightly coming out of bend two lap 3 allowing Reide back in front by a matter of inches. I think Christer had the throttle hard against the stop for the rest of the race and came back to win by about half a bikes length. Heat 13 was a repeat of Heat 11 except that this time Christer was round the line unusually for him and Reidar round the boards. Christer again locked up a bit, same place ad before, but being on the inside, he recovered more quickly and again won by about half a length. Speedway at its absolute best. Anyone else remember it ? One of the few programmes I still have. West Ham closed down for redevelopment soon after and I felt bereft. I continued to Hackney for a time but it was never quite the same to me and eventually I drifted away for many years until returning to Lakeside, which for me somehow captured the mood of Wets Ham in a way that Hackney never did, not for me anyway.

Looking back over old programmes it is surprising the number of riders that my memory tells me were very good weren’t actually all that consistent, it’s just that I have been judging them on the basis of a few great races I remember and one tends to forget the ones they don’t do so well.

They are to all intents and purposes, the public face of speedways administrative body. They are by far the worst leaders the sport has ever seen. Both are totally inarticulate, totally unimaginative , totally unable to project themselves or the sport, totally unable and unwilling to comunicate with the fans in a meaningful way, and totally unable to seriously consider any outlook on the sport but their own. Other promiters may have simialar flaws but these are the two front men who should be selling the sport. Quite seriously, what progress has the sport made since they have taken over the reins , despite Chapmans bluster at the outset ? They are the worst of a bad bunch. Beyond useless.

So if we say, in general terms, the quality of the racing is roughly the same as it's always been, some good meetings, some not so good, then as long as there are not too many bad meetings, we can say it's not the quality of the racing that turns people away. Obviously there are a lot more ways to spend your leisure time today than there were 30 or 40 years ago, and less and less people want to stand around in stadiums all evening because it's not just Speedwáy that has suffered. Dog racing has suffered heavily and stick cars are not doing as well as they used to. So if we say that is not the on track action that had turned fans away, at least not in great numbers, it has to be the off track issues like presentation and the cheating which to my mind is a major factor , even though it was probably always there to a point. If it is the off track issues that are the problem then that falls back in the lap of the BSPA. Unless and until the likes of Godfrey and Chapman take a long look at themselves and take their share of responsibility, nothing will change.

If the future of the sport is in the hands of Godfrey and Chapman we might as well shut up shop now . Godfrey behaviour last season was beyond the pale. As 50+ year follwer of the sport since knee high to a grasshopper, I now find motivation to see another meeting ver difficult, and it’s almost entirely due to Godfreys machinations last year. The sport can’t afford to lose a single fan yet Godfrey has just turned thousands away. The man is a complete and utter plonker. As one promoter said to me last season, the way things are going we will finish up with the same two teams facing each other eeek after week, nothing else left.

So let’s get this right. You start a thread asking a question you already know the answer to, and which nobody has the slightest interest in, and when challenged you try to tell us your reason for starting it was to see if Iris 123 would trail you . Of course you didn’t expect him to catch you out by pointing out that it was just another of your attention seeking scams. Take notice of what Chunky says and stop making a complete fool of yourself.

Jack Young, Adam Shields, Dave Watt, Nick Morris, Geoff Mudge , Aub Lawson, Leigh Adams, Jason. Crump,

A excellent choice, if I may say so Mr Bold, although I have liked to include the Hurri-Ken himself, namely the immaculate Mr McKinlay.

The duplicity of the BSPA general and Rob Godfrey in particular knows no bounds. My utmost sympathy to Worky fans. It was Godfreys interference in the fixture list that created the problem.You can bet your bottom dollar that if Scunthorpe were in Workys situation acw@y round it would have been found. Still more money in the BSPA coffers and another promoter who loves the sport forced out.