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The continuing decline of Speedway

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You need to build up a love for your team and a hatred of others. How can you do either of these when the club remains the same but the faces always change?

Edited by moxey63
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On 8/10/2018 at 10:30 PM, steve roberts said:

...I would add the disappearance of speedway in the capitol generally which must have affected it's stature within the mass media outlets.

I'd also throw in the Sunday People race fixing scandal of 1984.  In reality the sport has never recovered.

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25 minutes ago, Stoke Potter said:

I'd also throw in the Sunday People race fixing scandal of 1984.  In reality the sport has never recovered.

...Personally I always felt that it was a  bit of a Red Herring. In reality most fans realised that race 'manipulation' was always present going right back to probably when speedway first became known. 

'The Sunday People' always used to thrive on gutter/smutty journalism and/or articles and then by writing an article supposing to be investigatory journalism they then assumed that we should all sit up and take notice and take the paper seriously. Ivan Mauger once said when asked what he thought about the stories (and some were quite laughable) by one of their journalists he replied "Who f**king cares...nobody reads your paper!" 

I guess those not familiar with speedway having read the stories saw the sport as being flawed but then many sports before and since have had uncomplimentary articles published regarding many issues (drugs in particular) and don't appear to have been damaged to any great degree within the public eye.

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11 hours ago, steve roberts said:

...Personally I always felt that it was a  bit of a Red Herring. In reality most fans realised that race 'manipulation' was always present going right back to probably when speedway first became known. 

'The Sunday People' always used to thrive on gutter/smutty journalism and/or articles and then by writing an article supposing to be investigatory journalism they then assumed that we should all sit up and take notice and take the paper seriously. Ivan Mauger once said when asked what he thought about the stories (and some were quite laughable) by one of their journalists he replied "Who f**king cares...nobody reads your paper!" 

I guess those not familiar with speedway having read the stories saw the sport as being flawed but then many sports before and since have had uncomplimentary articles published regarding many issues (drugs in particular) and don't appear to have been damaged to any great degree within the public eye.

Remember playing pool in a pub the night the story featured on the national news - might have been BBC's 9 o'clock - and much of the pub stopped and watched. There was quite an interest. If it were now, most in the pub would be surprised speedway still exists.   

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11 hours ago, steve roberts said:

...Personally I always felt that it was a  bit of a Red Herring. In reality most fans realised that race 'manipulation' was always present going right back to probably when speedway first became known. 

'The Sunday People' always used to thrive on gutter/smutty journalism and/or articles and then by writing an article supposing to be investigatory journalism they then assumed that we should all sit up and take notice and take the paper seriously. Ivan Mauger once said when asked what he thought about the stories (and some were quite laughable) by one of their journalists he replied "Who f**king cares...nobody reads your paper!" 

I guess those not familiar with speedway having read the stories saw the sport as being flawed but then many sports before and since have had uncomplimentary articles published regarding many issues (drugs in particular) and don't appear to have been damaged to any great degree within the public eye.

I don't think the Sunday People had any bearing at all on the problems of speedway today. If any fans were lost because of it, that would have been in 1984, and crowds then were very healthy compared to now. The idea of Bruce Penhall winning the 1981 World Final because Jiri Stancl let him beat him was, as you say, pretty laughable anyway, and any speedway fan would have known that.

The sport was still doing fine after that.

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You've got to remember, speedway has had decades of thinking the sport is losing popularity. They have always tried new ideas to keep fans interested. Rider Control, maximum points limit, new competitions like the old League Cup in the 80s, and the change of race format that brought, ditching the popular 13 because they thought fans wanted something different when, at that time, they just wanted dirt on tracks (Phil Collins quit the BL for this reason).  They introduced riders' bonus points in the KOC to go towards team scores - but that idea lasted just the one year. Six man teams, eight-man teams... Tactical subs, Golden Doubles and six-lap nominate heats. Most of these ideas have been ditched, so they weren't the best. Promoters have tried, but would it have been best to stop all the tinkering?   

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3 minutes ago, moxey63 said:

You've got to remember, speedway has had decades of thinking the sport is losing popularity. They have always tried new ideas to keep fans interested. Rider Control, maximum points limit, new competitions like the old League Cup in the 80s, and the change of race format that brought, ditching the popular 13 because they thought fans wanted something different when, at that time, they just wanted dirt on tracks (Phil Collins quit the BL for this reason).  They introduced riders' bonus points in the KOC to go towards team scores - but that idea lasted just the one year. Six man teams, eight-man teams... Tactical subs, Golden Doubles and six-lap nominate heats. Most of these ideas have been ditched, so they weren't the best. Promoters have tried, but would it have been best to stop all the tinkering?   

The league cup was a decent season opener, and was probably brought in due to the number of clubs in the top flight reducing. I remember one year they went as far as effectively having two league campaigns - with all the clubs meeting each other in the league cup and then again in the league - and then having a final for the league cup at the end of the year. This was taking things too far really.

I don't see how increasing from 13 to 15 heats is a negative, although when they first did it they added a second reserve race. The format now is better, although the protected heats format was the worst. The nominated riders heats at the end is a good addition.

Bonus points in the KO Cup? I don't remember that. Terrible idea. As was the TR and the Golden Double. The TR was the most stupid introduction of all. They should never have got rid of the old tac subs really, as this was a major tactical discussion point throughout the meeting. When they did that, they effectively changed the entire sport and what it's all about. But, if they brought it back now, people would probably be outraged at how unfair it is to the winning side.

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25 minutes ago, Grachan said:

The league cup was a decent season opener, and was probably brought in due to the number of clubs in the top flight reducing. I remember one year they went as far as effectively having two league campaigns - with all the clubs meeting each other in the league cup and then again in the league - and then having a final for the league cup at the end of the year. This was taking things too far really.

I don't see how increasing from 13 to 15 heats is a negative, although when they first did it they added a second reserve race. The format now is better, although the protected heats format was the worst. The nominated riders heats at the end is a good addition.

Bonus points in the KO Cup? I don't remember that. Terrible idea. As was the TR and the Golden Double. The TR was the most stupid introduction of all. They should never have got rid of the old tac subs really, as this was a major tactical discussion point throughout the meeting. When they did that, they effectively changed the entire sport and what it's all about. But, if they brought it back now, people would probably be outraged at how unfair it is to the winning side.

Riders' bonus points were incorporated into team scores in the 1995 KO Cup.

The League Cup was a good competition lasting six years. To have the LC  league matches early in the season and the final in October was laughable. 

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Why were fixed gate positions brought in?

With the TS and choice of gates if you were 6 points behind teams had better options.

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1 hour ago, moxey63 said:

Riders' bonus points were incorporated into team scores in the 1995 KO Cup.

The League Cup was a good competition lasting six years. To have the LC  league matches early in the season and the final in October was laughable. 

The League Cup was a good competition in my opinion also...except some teams used it to manipulate their averages before the league campaign started. Oxford headed the League Cup table in 1987 but suffered once the league started...and I agree, why was final held during October?  Oxford missed out on a clean sweep of trophies during 1986 because they ran out of dates and the weather closed in...although they morally won in my view having done the hard work at Cradley having drawn and won in the KO Cup and League Cup first legs!

Edited by steve roberts
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10 minutes ago, GWC said:

Why were fixed gate positions brought in?

With the TS and choice of gates if you were 6 points behind teams had better options.

...never like fixed gates. Took away a certain amount of tactical ploy. It was also a bit of a myth that top riders always took the best gate because when one reads accounts and/or interviews it wasn't always the case as many would have us believe.

Edited by steve roberts

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5 minutes ago, steve roberts said:

...never like fixed gates. Took away a certain amount of tactical ploy. It was also a bit of a myth that top riders always took the best gate because when one reads accounts and/or interviews it wasn't always the case as many would have us believe.

I like fixed gates. It means everybody gets a chance off the best gates and therefore the second strings or reserves get a better chance of out gating the best riders at least once per match. It also means that gating tarts have to go off the worst gates once or twice per match. 

 

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1 hour ago, GWC said:

Why were fixed gate positions brought in?

Supposedly to stop the top riders dominating, but possibly another cost cutting measures as fixed gates tended to reduce the scoring opportunities for the top riders who'd presumably on higher points money.

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2 hours ago, Daytripper said:

I like fixed gates. It means everybody gets a chance off the best gates and therefore the second strings or reserves get a better chance of out gating the best riders at least once per match. It also means that gating tarts have to go off the worst gates once or twice per match. 

 

Trouble was/is with 'fixed gates' is that they allowed an advantage to whatever team when gates didn't alternate (successive inside or outside gates) and as dirt moved outwards it proved advantageous or disadvantageous or those with successive early inside gates before the dirt moved out...whatever the scenario. 

I seem to recall that a team were programmed to ride three inside gates out of four and which obviously worked the other way.

Edited by steve roberts

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6 hours ago, Grachan said:

I don't think the Sunday People had any bearing at all on the problems of speedway today. If any fans were lost because of it, that would have been in 1984, and crowds then were very healthy compared to now. The idea of Bruce Penhall winning the 1981 World Final because Jiri Stancl let him beat him was, as you say, pretty laughable anyway, and any speedway fan would have known that.

The sport was still doing fine after that.

I have the 1981 final on video and stancl does let penhall get away in the last heat but he had already  done enough before that to be a deserved winner .

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