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Crayford Speedway Memories

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Went to Crayford just the once (1983) when Crayford took on Hasse Holmqvist's Swedish club side...strange experience and seemed to be a mini Wimbledon and although outside one got the impression that you were under cover with the imposing surrounding grandstands.

 

Track was a bit too small for my liking but a fascinating experience all the same.

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Has any BSF member an update on what has happened at Crayford Stadium in recent years? Besides the loss of speedway, the stock cars also went after a few more years. I think the venue has been completely rebuilt and is now much smaller stadium-wise than it was when the two forms of motorsport took place there. Greyhound racing it seems is the venue's only activity nowadays?

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Has any BSF member an update on what has happened at Crayford Stadium in recent years? Besides the loss of speedway, the stock cars also went after a few more years. I think the venue has been completely rebuilt and is now much smaller stadium-wise than it was when the two forms of motorsport took place there. Greyhound racing it seems is the venue's only activity nowadays?

Owned by Ladbrokes- they race 5 times a week.

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Went to Crayford just the once (1983) when Crayford took on Hasse Holmqvist's Swedish club side...strange experience and seemed to be a mini Wimbledon and although outside one got the impression that you were under cover with the imposing surrounding grandstands.

 

Track was a bit too small for my liking but a fascinating experience all the same.

I was there that night too! Worst thing about Crayford was that poxy drive around the south circular.

 

Steve

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I was there that night too! Worst thing about Crayford was that poxy drive around the south circular.

 

Steve

It was a wet and miserable night and I drove from Oxford just to see Hasse for one last time. However I went via the equally awful North Circular to pick my brother up at Ilford before continuing onto Crayford...a long night!

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Motorcycle road racing and TT champion Harold Daniell was among the speedway riders competing at Crayford in the early 1930s. Here's a look at his successful non-speedway career:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Daniell

 

I have read SOMEWHERE that Harold Daniell, who lived and worked in nearby Forest Hill, may also have raced in the early speedway racing at Crystal Palace circa 1928 and 1929. Can any Poster refute or confirm this. However, his best speedway exploits do appear to have been in the Crayford meetings in the early 1930s.

Edited by Guest

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I was a regular at Crayford from 1975 to 1983. It was a tricky little track with poor viewing facilities, but I still enjoyed going there. It was all under cover with decent food outlets. It had a train station right next door, with good rail links to and from London.

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I can see no mention of the names Mick Mitchell and Keith Harvey, but I am certain that I recollect reading somewhere a good few years ago that both were regulars at Crayford in the pre-WW2 period. Can any Poster confirm this or convince me that I am wrong in this belief?

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A small track that produced some fantastic racing, a highlight being the inter league meeting with Belle Vue in 1977. Watching Peter Collins master the track in his first race and then if I remember correctly breaking the track record in his second. PC was spectacular and a joy to watch on a track, which he had never seen before that meeting.

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I was there one night- no idea of the year- I do know it was Crayford v Milton Keynes because Barry Allaway was riding. At Crayford the fence didn`t go all the way around - there was an overlap and no fence where the pits were on the 1st bend. Anyway someone fell but the bike righted itself and with the throttle stuck wide open took off straight through this gap scattering people right left and centre !!!!!

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Has any BSF member an update on what has happened at Crayford Stadium in recent years? Besides the loss of speedway, the stock cars also went after a few more years. I think the venue has been completely rebuilt and is now much smaller stadium-wise than it was when the two forms of motorsport took place there. Greyhound racing it seems is the venue's only activity nowadays?

 

 

Owned by Ladbrokes- they race 5 times a week.

 

​This is the modernised Crayford Stadium - where only greyhound racing now takes place:

http://www.crayford.com

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Over the past few years, Kent Kings have done much to keep alive memories of Wimbledon.

Some years ago, they also established contacts through the late Bryn Williams and Derek Barclay - the Kings' current pressman - with Crayford.
But while Wimbledon have continued to flourish annually on the Kings' scene, Crayford have slid out of the limelight.
IMO it would be nice if, as happens with Wimbledon, that a Crayford link to Kent Migs could be established Just food for thought at the moment - but I wonder if there are others who would also like to see an annual comparative meeting to honour Crayford?

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