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1 hour ago, DunRobin said:

Thursday was the original fixed night agreed with the FIM. It was only changed to Wednesday because of some Championship club failing to agree. They should have stuck to their guns & forced it through. By switching to the Wednesday night, t has caused problems for any club that has Danish riders.

Thursday still wouldn't have helped Rye House

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Swindon has the majority of its future meetings this season on a monday or wednesday rather than running most meetings so far this year on a thursday, so it will be interesting to see what effect it has on the numbers attending.  Hopefully very little but who knows. 

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2 minutes ago, magnificentseven said:

Thursday still wouldn't have helped Rye House

It's pretty obvious that clubs need to run on the best night for them,and in a league that comes within their budget,don't think many clubs are making much profit,(if any).

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5 minutes ago, Fromafar said:

It's pretty obvious that clubs need to run on the best night for them,and in a league that comes within their budget,don't think many clubs are making much profit,(if any).

I fear that many are deeply in the red

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28 minutes ago, Racin Jason 72 said:

Surely Redcar Ipswich and Sheffield would be in the same position that rye house are now in. Why is it ok to possibly kill three tracks just to prop up the premiership?? 

It's not ok to kill 3 tracks, certainly not, but trotting out the 'prop up the Premiership' line is laughable.

Tracks need to run on best night to suit them, that should be their choice.

The problem comes with all of the doubling up that has been allowed to increase year on year giving all sorts of clashes and pieced together teams as well as causing a mess with averages between the two leagues. This needs restricting first and foremost.

Clubs should then run on the night they think suits their fanbase best. Clubs with assets should have first call in all instances on those riders, even for re-arranged fixtures. We'd then see which league is propping up the other. It would encourage the Championship to invest in fresh talent rather than relying on borrowing riders from the other league.....and vice versa.

It won't happen overnight as it has gone too far, but restrictions on doubling up are vital should 2/3 leagues remain.

Edited to add, if there is financial trouble at Rye, I hope they can come out the other side. If that means the BSPA backtracking on FRN then so be. We shouldn't be losing Clubs over a silly choice of nights made in November.

Edited by Reliant Robin
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1 hour ago, Daniel Smith said:

We'll get into a situation where Rye House moves to a Saturday but the away clubs refuse to reschedule the fixtures. Same if Belle Vue go Friday's, clubs will refuse to move their original dates.

With Denmark, Poland and SEC, GP practice running Friday's, Poland, SEC, SGP Saturday's a change to the calendar now is pretty much a no go.

Dan Bewley's World U21 meetings so far, and the meetings he will miss typifies British Speedway and all that is wrong with it...

Dan should never have to miss a single meeting as he should be a major drawer card for the Sport with every track wanting him to appear, as (away) I am sure he could attract those more irregular visitors to the sport who will know his name and reputation, and (home) ensure his own fans dont feel brassed off as he is elsewhere. (Even more so if they lose that match)!!

Instead I suspect some teams are even targeting these dates (if not already booked) to go up to Worky as they will feel "we have a chance if they've not got Dan"..

The same will be true of the teams who still have to ride at home v Worky. "Let's try and rearrange on a night when Dan cannot be there" may well form part of any planning process...

There are weeks and weeks of 'No Speedway', then, when all Leagues and FIM individual competitions come to the 'business end' of the Season, the riders who do well (invariably therefore the ones you want to watch) always seem to be riding 'elsewhere'...

It cannot be beyond the whit of man to run British Speedway's fixtures around what the FIM and other Countries have already set in stone..

And it is truly incredible that, rather than colllectively work together, teams will try and put one over each other to try and win something that is defined by their very own operating model, as even less valuable than 'tin pot'...

I actually think that one of the reasons there will never be an independent figurehead running the Sport over here is because they would simply not accept meetings voluntarily being arranged/taking place without the 'top riders' being available.

Imagine explaining to a Barry Hearn type character, if they were in charge, that you thought it was a 'great idea' to run a Speedway Meeting knowing full well that your best riders/biggest attractions wouldnt be there?

You would hear the laughter all the way to Poland..

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Following on from my earlier post, I would just like to elaborate a little. There ARE a number of posters on here who make intelligent and balanced posts, but they too are often shot down because someone didn't didn't agree with them; that is where the problem lay.

Now, with reference to Phil's comment about Polish speedway benefiting from clubs being in towns where speedway is the major attraction; the fact remains that they are "in town". I have said before that in Britain, speedway grew as a "city-centre sport". Because of a number of factors - in particular, the Great British NIMBY - we have been forced into rural areas, where people aren't exposed to speedway. Of course, we have always had rural tracks, but look at it now. Not one track in London. During my lifetime, we have lost Norwich, Exeter, Bradford, Cradley, Bristol, Hull etc... These were all in urban areas, and easily accessible. Not only were they accessible, they were VISIBLE to anyone who passed by the place!

To me, it is incredible - and incredibly sad - that the vast majority of people now have never even heard of speedway, let alone know what it is. Back in the day, as popular as speedway was, we still attracted a very small percentage of the population - but nearly everybody knew what it was! We used to complain when people said they didn't go because speedway was "first out of the gate wins". Today, it's a struggle to find somebody who knows we have a ruddy gate!

I know we all feel that the modern sport is "watered down". Yes, I used to love seeing the big stars, but you know what? It is speedway RACING, and as long as there was some decent racing, I was happy.

Steve

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When I was young Rye House was a training track staging meetings at what would now be National League level. My first visit was for I think the Ronnie Moore Trophy won by Lou Sansom. I remember Rocky Coutts and Charlie Benham being in it. Great entertainment.

Then they took over from the late lamented Rayleigh and became a second-tier track. In the Infradex years they were a superb team with Garrad, Fiala, Smith, Hubbard and others (Silver, Cox etc also). Edinburgh generally got slaughtered there from 1977 onwards.

Then they had some weaker sides but it was still an entertaining venue. In the Monarchs’ best years we won there quite a few times. Len Silver saved the track from extinction.

Then we come to the new promotion. Presumably they have been successful in their other fields and thought they could invest and then rake in the profits. This is where other promoters should be firm. I know it isn’t easy but Speedway desperately needs to guard against naïve promoters with big ideas. Unless they are so keen and so wealthy they are prepared to lose millions, they have to be made to understand what they are getting into. Remember the Reading Bulldogs?

It will be another very sad blow if we lose this historic venue.

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16 minutes ago, chunky said:

Following on from my earlier post, I would just like to elaborate a little. There ARE a number of posters on here who make intelligent and balanced posts, but they too are often shot down because someone didn't didn't agree with them; that is where the problem lay.

Now, with reference to Phil's comment about Polish speedway benefiting from clubs being in towns where speedway is the major attraction; the fact remains that they are "in town". I have said before that in Britain, speedway grew as a "city-centre sport". Because of a number of factors - in particular, the Great British NIMBY - we have been forced into rural areas, where people aren't exposed to speedway. Of course, we have always had rural tracks, but look at it now. Not one track in London. During my lifetime, we have lost Norwich, Exeter, Bradford, Cradley, Bristol, Hull etc... These were all in urban areas, and easily accessible. Not only were they accessible, they were VISIBLE to anyone who passed by the place!

To me, it is incredible - and incredibly sad - that the vast majority of people now have never even heard of speedway, let alone know what it is. Back in the day, as popular as speedway was, we still attracted a very small percentage of the population - but nearly everybody knew what it was! We used to complain when people said they didn't go because speedway was "first out of the gate wins". Today, it's a struggle to find somebody who knows we have a ruddy gate!

I know we all feel that the modern sport is "watered down". Yes, I used to love seeing the big stars, but you know what? It is speedway RACING, and as long as there was some decent racing, I was happy.

Steve

When I was younger I could visit Bradford, Belle Vue, Halifax, Sheffield and Doncaster, all by public transport and home again the same evening. Now groups of young friends can't get to many tracks and the entry price would probably put them off anyway. Only one of those tracks now exists and I'm no longer inclined to visit that at my age, lack of transport and the cost. You mentioned London, I used to have trips down to those tracks, my favourite being Wimbledon. I watch the sport on TV, the big events are OK but some of the league matches are terrible, all the crowd in one small corner of a sh**tip of a stadium and tracks that suited old uprights but not modern machines. Speedway in this country has a sort of sepia image of flat caps, belted raincoats and going home looking like a miner. I think it needs to be run around weekends and Bank Holidays, so as to become a paying hobby, rather than a main means of making a living. It needs someone to have the bravery to enforce it, before it disappears in a cloud of dust.

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5 minutes ago, foamfence said:

When I was younger I could visit Bradford, Belle Vue, Halifax, Sheffield and Doncaster, all by public transport and home again the same evening. Now groups of young friends can't get to many tracks and the entry price would probably put them off anyway. Only one of those tracks now exists and I'm no longer inclined to visit that at my age, lack of transport and the cost. You mentioned London, I used to have trips down to those tracks, my favourite being Wimbledon. I watch the sport on TV, the big events are OK but some of the league matches are terrible, all the crowd in one small corner of a sh**tip of a stadium and tracks that suited old uprights but not modern machines. Speedway in this country has a sort of sepia image of flat caps, belted raincoats and going home looking like a miner. I think it needs to be run around weekends and Bank Holidays, so as to become a paying hobby, rather than a main means of making a living. It needs someone to have the bravery to enforce it, before it disappears in a cloud of dust.

2 of the tracks still exist - BV and Sheffield

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I said a while back that trying to make all tracks fit into a league model doesn’t work.Maybe have one,2 or 3 tracks running an open licence outside of the league system would help save them....

What we have is dead weight tied around the leg of some tracks and we are always pandering to the weak teams.It hasn’t worked.Like you i have seen some terrible league meetings on tv where riders can hardly get round the track and terrible crowds with no atmosphere.That just isn’t going to help the sport,no matter what night of the week you run.And one big problem we now face that we didn’t before is that football now takes place practically every day,so no way of avoiding the clash

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6 minutes ago, OveFundinFan said:

2 of the tracks still exist - BV and Sheffield

Belle Vue exists as a club but Hyde Road is long gone as a track.

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4 minutes ago, foamfence said:

Belle Vue exists as a club but Hyde Road is long gone as a track.

Same public transport will get you there....its only a few hundred yards away (as you probably know)

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34 minutes ago, foamfence said:

Belle Vue exists as a club but Hyde Road is long gone as a track.

No. We got better now

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3 minutes ago, Phil The Ace said:

No. We got better now

And yet, much lower crowds...

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