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cinderfella

Meaningful Second Halves anyone?

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3 hours ago, Daniel Smith said:

From heat 1, 2mins on and a countdown clock and ready to race on zero. Not ready, excluded with no replacement allowed. No return to pits or they too are excluded. 

Winning rider rides round for lap of honour, while doing so 2mins on for next heat and so on.

5min break every 4 heats. Allows for track grade, toilet/tea breaks for medical teams etc.

No more intervals, absolutely pointless.

I think we'd all like to see matches per se speeded up, but then the 15-heat programme would be even less of a night's entertainment and be over well within an hour, and fans would consider they've had even less for their money, esp'ly when you're forking out for a family  . . . then Second Halves certainly would be necessary to justify your spend.

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5 hours ago, MattK said:

Unfortunately, these are often commercial suicide. You don't attract any new fans by running a junior team, but you do incur additional costs, so you are totally reliant on your main fans attending twice as many meetings. Coupled with that, if your senior team is doing poorly, fans can chose to only attend the junior team, so you are cannibalising your own customers, see Oxford in 2007 as an example.

Many teams have tried running both a senior team and a junior team (Swindon, Poole, King's Lynn, Lakeside, Rye House, Wolves (Cradley), Belle Vue, Coventry, Leicester) and yet only a handful continue to do so.

I think you misunderstood me, I would like to see every team run a junior side as part of second half racing, not as a separate team on a different night. These juniors would be part of the NJL, MDL, SJL set up, rather than National League. It would be set up for riders starting off in the sport and on 125, 250 and 500cc, a stepping stone towards the National League.

I realise in the past many clubs have tried to run second teams in the National League and yes, it is very tough financially. Only clubs who are lucky enough to own their stadiums can really justify it, which is a shame, because I still think in the long run, it is the best way to establish riders in the sport.

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39 minutes ago, britmet said:

I think we'd all like to see matches per se speeded up, but then the 15-heat programme would be even less of a night's entertainment and be over well within an hour, and fans would consider they've had even less for their money, esp'ly when you're forking out for a family  . . . then Second Halves certainly would be necessary to justify your spend.

I don't think that's true at all. Many today are just fed up of the constant standing about with nothing happening and meaningless chit chat from the centre green. What's required is for the race to be finished and on with the next one.

Families would most certainly be happy to be over and done with within at least 60-80mins

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4 hours ago, Daniel Smith said:

I don't think that's true at all. Many today are just fed up of the constant standing about with nothing happening and meaningless chit chat from the centre green. What's required is for the race to be finished and on with the next one.

Families would most certainly be happy to be over and done with within at least 60-80mins

...trouble is that if a meeting only consisted of fifteen races and each race started as soon as the previous one had finished the whole meeting would be done and dusted in 30 minutes at the maximum. 

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42 minutes ago, steve roberts said:

...trouble is that if a meeting only consisted of fifteen races and each race started as soon as the previous one had finished the whole meeting would be done and dusted in 30 minutes at the maximum. 

How on earth do you work that out? 

Based on an average of 15 mins for the 15 races..  plus 2 minutes between each race.. That's 45. There's generally track grading, fallers, tapes exclusions, a tactical or reserve ride meaning two in a row.. the nominated heat.

90 mins is a realistic time all clubs should be striving to achieve in my opinion.

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53 minutes ago, BWitcher said:

How on earth do you work that out? 

Based on an average of 15 mins for the 15 races..  plus 2 minutes between each race.. That's 45. There's generally track grading, fallers, tapes exclusions, a tactical or reserve ride meaning two in a row.. the nominated heat.

90 mins is a realistic time all clubs should be striving to achieve in my opinion.

...I was taking Daniel's post literally "What's required is for the race to be finished and on with the next one"

My post was very much tongue firmly in cheek and not meant to be taken seriously knowing obviously what's involved with any particular meeting and differing scenarios that may arise and/or occur in same.

Edited by steve roberts

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1 hour ago, steve roberts said:

...I was taking Daniel's post literally "What's required is for the race to be finished and on with the next one"

My post was very much tongue firmly in cheek and not meant to be taken seriously knowing obviously what's involved with any particular meeting and differing scenarios that may arise and/or occur in same.

It literally can't be finished within 30 mins though, never mind at the maximum :) Forget all the other issues. 

 

Edited by BWitcher

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22 hours ago, *JJ said:

You are confusing second National League teams with Development League teams. At the moment, only Belle Vue do the former: I don't know how popular this is. However, plenty of teams have MDL/NJL/SDL teams, which run as 'second halves' after the main match. These don't incur any extra costs, as the riders are not paid, and the track staff  etc. are there anyway, and all other costs come under the main match.  DL teams are invaluable for riders to gain experience and skill before making the jump up to NL standard. Very few NL riders have come up any other way other than the Junior Speedway set up.

Sadly until clubs embrace the development leagues the sport will continue to slide. There are scores of riders who started out in these leagues and prosper but they are still shunned by many promotions & the governing bodies. The costs imposed upon the volunteers who decide to run them are huge, the mileage the riders put in is vast as so few teams compete. Referees refuse to officiate over any more than an additional 6 heats and there is at least one club i know where the track staff wanted extra to stay on for the second half (which now no longer happens at that track).

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19 hours ago, Daniel Smith said:

I don't think that's true at all. Many today are just fed up of the constant standing about with nothing happening and meaningless chit chat from the centre green. What's required is for the race to be finished and on with the next one.

Families would most certainly be happy to be over and done with within at least 60-80mins

Sure, meetings need to move on fairly quickly, but 60 minutes is far too short. I would say 90 minutes is a more reasonable time.

You need some time between races. What you don't need is hanging around while a tractor chugs round for 5 minutes.

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33 minutes ago, Grachan said:

Sure, meetings need to move on fairly quickly, but 60 minutes is far too short. I would say 90 minutes is a more reasonable time.

You need some time between races. What you don't need is hanging around while a tractor chugs round for 5 minutes.

5 mins after every 4 heats is very reasonable. Toilet break, food or drink etc etc. With intervals everyone does all these at once and queues get ridiculous sometimes. Ending up missing a heat or 2 because of.

Also when TV is in town there is then no need to change an already set schedule. 

4mins is plenty of time from 1 heat to the next. 2mins, race, lap of honour then 2mins.

If everything runs perfect a meeting can be done in 80mins. Allowing for other factors in a meeting would take it to around 90-100mins. All very reasonable. 

Meeting today are still unnecessarily dragged out, quite a bit caused by the rider's themselves with 2-3 of gardening. Then when an anomaly crops up meetings are over 2 hours and becomes a drag for everyone. That then becomes unacceptable. 

Even with things like tape touching/breaking the 2 mins should be straight on and rider's at the start. Even if the tapes ain't completely fixed.

All the time given for 2 on the trot is unnecessary. 

There has to be a much tighter schedule for British Speedway, like I said, when an anomaly comes along people would still leave meetings at a reasonable time. 

I'd even make it rule that no meetings are allowed to run past 10pm regardless.

And with the original post of this thread, no to 2nd halves. About a quarter of the attendances would watch. No point adding extra costs to an evening for about 100-200 folk.

Edited by Daniel Smith

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3 hours ago, Sings4Speedway said:

Sadly until clubs embrace the development leagues the sport will continue to slide. There are scores of riders who started out in these leagues and prosper but they are still shunned by many promotions & the governing bodies. The costs imposed upon the volunteers who decide to run them are huge, the mileage the riders put in is vast as so few teams compete. Referees refuse to officiate over any more than an additional 6 heats and there is at least one club i know where the track staff wanted extra to stay on for the second half (which now no longer happens at that track).

Tell me about it ... I have experienced all of this helping a rider over the last few years. He has now given up for all of these reasons, plus others.

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Last night at Kent, the first ten heats where run in 37 minutes!. I know they got a move on to accommodate the Ben fund collection, but it shows what can be done.

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On 8/26/2018 at 1:00 PM, cityrebel said:

From a personal point of view, I've never liked 2nd halves. I used to watch them as a kid at Wembley and Wimbledon, but I found them boring. I'd like speedway to be like football, done and dusted in 90 minutes.

Football is around 100 minutes now. If you stop riders gardening (that was supposed to have happened), and referees be sharper when they put on the 'two minutes" then meetings might get back to under 90 minutes

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