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Wee Eck

BSI lose GPs

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I know there’s a GP section but this maybe requires wider circulation. 
It seems Eurosport/Discovery in conjunction with OneSport have won the rights to the SGP from 2021. Because of the OneSport involvement, that means that, once more, the Poles have won out against the Brits. 
Should supporters of British Speedway be worried?

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8 minutes ago, Wee Eck said:

I know there’s a GP section but this maybe requires wider circulation. 
It seems Eurosport/Discovery in conjunction with OneSport have won the rights to the SGP from 2021. Because of the OneSport involvement, that means that, once more, the Poles have won out against the Brits. 
Should supporters of British Speedway be worried?

The devil will be in the detail.

It could become a similar scenario to F1 where organisers try "new locations" 

Would do GP Speedway no harm to cement a part of the series that could be run in our winter (say late Jan and February) in Australia / NZ / USA and may be time to take Speedway to the "bike crazy" Spain and also a Far Eastern stop over. All you need is a suitable medium sized 30-40,000 capacity stadia or showground to get it on.

That may even suit the Poles as could elongate the GP season and mean fewer clashes in summer when Poles may want fewer GP weekends??..so GP stretches Feb - November more like F1 and not all crammed in to May - October period.

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any ideas when the Monster sponsorship deal runs to?

i know people don't like it but it IS a big name sponsor

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10 hours ago, stevehone said:

any ideas when the Monster sponsorship deal runs to?

i know people don't like it but it IS a big name sponsor

No contracts currently go beyond the end of BSI’s contract - 2021

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On 12/2/2019 at 7:18 AM, HGould said:

The devil will be in the detail.

It could become a similar scenario to F1 where organisers try "new locations" 

Would do GP Speedway no harm to cement a part of the series that could be run in our winter (say late Jan and February) in Australia / NZ / USA and may be time to take Speedway to the "bike crazy" Spain and also a Far Eastern stop over. All you need is a suitable medium sized 30-40,000 capacity stadia or showground to get it on.

That may even suit the Poles as could elongate the GP season and mean fewer clashes in summer when Poles may want fewer GP weekends??..so GP stretches Feb - November more like F1 and not all crammed in to May - October period.

Everything you've written there about a winter tour in Aus and NZ then say Argentina and the US and even Thailand, Japan and Malaysia who all have massive bike markets. Even a small foothold in those Asian countries would massively open up extra potentially massive exposure and income.

And there must have been some research into moving into spain. Whilst setting up a domestic scene is a far greater task, on the face of it I can help feel a gp in a Spanish football stadium in the summer will not only be a major must do to hardcore speedway fans, but a genuinely feel you would get local fans new to the sport. Again you get a tiny slice of the Spanish pie and its massive in terms of sponsorship.

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On 12/2/2019 at 11:05 AM, Wee Eck said:

It seems Eurosport/Discovery in conjunction with OneSport have won the rights to the SGP from 2021. Because of the OneSport involvement, that means that, once more, the Poles have won out against the Brits.
Should supporters of British Speedway be worried?

BSI was owned by IMG(UK) which was wholly owned by its US-based parent company, so in what way have the Poles won out against the Brits?

The time for supporters of British Speedway to have been worried was 20 years ago...

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5 hours ago, Humphrey Appleby said:

BSI was owned by IMG(UK) which was wholly owned by its US-based parent company, so in what way have the Poles won out against the Brits?

The time for supporters of British Speedway to have been worried was 20 years ago...

BSI is a British company with its base in Britain. It’s ultimate owner is a US group now called Endeavour, of which IMG is a subsidiary.

BSI has been largely autonomous with Paul Bellamy, former MD of BSI (I think) having an over arching role whilst appointing a local MD, first Torben Olsen then earlier this year, Steve Gould.

Paul and Torben - and the FIM - fought to limit the influence of Polish speedway, and I assume that was part of Gould’s remit as well. The Poles have long maintained that they should be allowed to hold even more GPs than the three they now have and that Warsaw rather than Cardiff should be the marquee event. A senior FIM member was heard saying Baku to Monaco (in F1) is like Warsaw to Cardiff. Baku tries hard but it will never be Monaco. When the new consortium is in place, I expect Warsaw will become the number one event.

With BSI heading out of the picture (actually, no surprise there as they’ve failed to innovate) and OneSport - who already have the SEC and the World Under 21 Championship - part of the new package, I would expect at least one more GP in Poland from the start of the new franchise, at the expense of one or more in the rest of Europe, something that wouldn’t happen under BSI.

From a personal perspective, I’ve been disappointed by the lack of involvement of IMG. I really thought when they got involved, there would be a huge push but they don’t seem to have done much. Such a shame especially when you consider they have their own TV company, Transworld Sport that has shown but never really pushed GP speedway. 

My opinion is that the new franchise holders could well be good for speedway as a whole, which we know is now centred in Poland, but that is potentially detrimental to Britain. 

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Perhaps they will 'do away' with Cardiff so Warsaw truly is number one GP ...... it doesn't really matter where the GPs are if the tracks provide some great racing, that should be number one for the new promoters. No doubt they will give priority to big sponsorship, have to I guess.

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I was lucky enough to chat to a few FIM officials in the pits at Warsaw, and selling out Warsaw twice over still doesn't generate the profit a half filled Millenium stadium does. So who ever promoter is, it would make no sense to scrap or try to devalue the british gp.

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In other words, we can't rip the polish people off like the mugs in the UK.

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1 hour ago, bendover said:

In other words, we can't rip the polish people off like the mugs in the UK.

That’s a bit like Labours attitude to any one who voted Leave... must be a bit thick and stupid.          
No one is forcing Polish people, or indeed anyone, to pay to go to the British GP, or any GP, just as no one was forcing fans to go to Stockholm for the Swedish GPs, and I understand that was a very expensive trip to a GP.

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Not at all, my point is we pay over the odds for tickets in this country. 

We as a nation are too gullible when it comes to ticket prices for all sporting events. For example, People constantly complain about prices to watch Premiership football yet all the stadia are full with waiting lists for season tickets at many clubs. 

In fact, if you read through the Cardiff GP threads on here people are always moaning about the price of a ticket but still go.

Edited by bendover
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13 minutes ago, bendover said:

Not at all, my point is we pay over the odds for tickets in this country. 

We as a nation are too gullible when it comes to ticket prices for all sporting events. For example, People constantly complain about prices to watch Premiership football yet all the stadia are full with waiting lists for season tickets at many clubs. 

In fact, if you read through the Cardiff GP threads on here people are always moaning about the price of a ticket but still go.

I think you can count the number of full Premiership football stadia this year on one hand. That’s one sport that’s priced itself too high. But they don’t seem to care as ticket sales are now a small part of overall revenue - about 14% comes from that source, with around 70% coming from tv. 

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13 minutes ago, Wee Eck said:

I think you can count the number of full Premiership football stadia this year on one hand. That’s one sport that’s priced itself too high. But they don’t seem to care as ticket sales are now a small part of overall revenue - about 14% comes from that source, with around 70% coming from tv. 

Really?

How many fingers do you have on your hand.. 

Off the top of my head.. Wolves, Norwich, West Ham, Man Utd, Liverpool, Brighton... six teams that are sold out for every home game this season.

Add in Leicester, Chelsea, Aston Villa, Man City, Tottenham, Bournemouth, Everton, Arsenal to the above.

Crystal Palace almost every game.

Watford for most, almost full in the others.

So at least 14 teams with full stadiums for every single home game... and most of the others full in most games.



 

Edited by BWitcher

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