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2021 SGP Field

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Lets hope the gp challenge next season is after the last grand prix 

Edited by ray c
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Think they have got it right with Wildcards,perhaps have to review the Gp Challenge,although this years pandemic screwed up things,all riders should have an opportunity to Qualify for Challenge IMO.There are a lot of young talent not getting a chance to even compete.

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Like the look of the field for next season. Thomsen is an upgrade on Michelsen in theory. Berntzon and KK for Lindback and NKI is probably much of a muchness but they qualified by right and at least Berntzon is a new face. 

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Michelsen in fairness to him was a last minute replacement for Smolinski. He didn't have a winter to prepare mentally, financially or mechanically for being a GP rider. He will never be a World Champion but I'm not convinced Thomsen is better.

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6 hours ago, szkocjasid said:

Not sure why you should ban current GP riders from racing in the GP challenge, if a rider can't beat them in qualifying can they claim to deserve a GP place ahead of a current GP rider! 

Also if the top 15 in the World were in the GP's but 7th - 15th were guaranteed not t to be in the next season's series it would be a much weaker GP the following year!

I think we have some older riders that are not real competitive anymore but they keep returning to the field. Nigel and Kelvin made the point in one of the early telecasts about Zagar not having much incentive to compete for the top 6 as he was already in for next year. I would say Zagar and NKI are past it. I also recall the frustration we all had when Andy Smith kept getting in through the challenge way back in the 90's. I feel if we have talented younger riders on the way up it would be more preferable than the return of the  old stagers who in a lot of cases are just basically clogging up the field. 

Edited by gbrussell
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7 hours ago, gbrussell said:

I think we have some older riders that are not real competitive anymore but they keep returning to the field. Nigel and Kelvin made the point in one of the early telecasts about Zagar not having much incentive to compete for the top 6 as he was already in for next year. I would say Zagar and NKI are past it. I also recall the frustration we all had when Andy Smith kept getting in through the challenge way back in the 90's. I feel if we have talented younger riders on the way up it would be more preferable than the return of the  old stagers who in a lot of cases are just basically clogging up the field. 

IT would appear that there are some very good young riders coming through the ranks, including Britain,  and it is especially pleasing that a decent number are not Polish. The hope if not the expectation is that amongst this crop are the next generation of Grand Prix riders but we are not there yet.

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7 hours ago, gbrussell said:

I think we have some older riders that are not real competitive anymore but they keep returning to the field. Nigel and Kelvin made the point in one of the early telecasts about Zagar not having much incentive to compete for the top 6 as he was already in for next year. I would say Zagar and NKI are past it. I also recall the frustration we all had when Andy Smith kept getting in through the challenge way back in the 90's. I feel if we have talented younger riders on the way up it would be more preferable than the return of the  old stagers who in a lot of cases are just basically clogging up the field. 

If Zager keeps qualifying you really can’t knock him though ,think like I said there are only 1/2doz who could World Champ With this format ,the rest are making up the numbers till the young talent of the next generation come through.Even changing the scoring format this season didn’t really alter the Top Men.

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14 hours ago, therefused said:

Wild cards confirmed

Laguta

Sayfutdinov

Vaculik

Thomsen

Fricke

All very safe expected picks... maybe it's time to look at a radical overhaul of the SGP with the new rights holders. It seems to me that the only reason that 16 riders are included in a world final/ GP series is because mathematically this works out that each rider meets every other rider once over the course of 20 heats. Over the course of the World Championship there has generally never really been a rider been a rider from outside of the top 8 who have gone on to win it (although no doubt somebody will come up with an exception Szczakiel, Muller). Maybe it's time to cut the field down to 8-10 riders with each rider meeting each other multiple times, imagine watching Tai vs Bartek 3,4 or 5 times a night instead of NKI vs Lindback vs Michelsen vs Zagar who with the best will in the world are never going to be World Champions, especially under a GP series

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13 minutes ago, PHILIPRISING said:

IT would appear that there are some very good young riders coming through the ranks, including Britain,  and it is especially pleasing that a decent number are not Polish. The hope if not the expectation is that amongst this crop are the next generation of Grand Prix riders but we are not there yet.

There are a lot of decent Young Poles though.Most of them would blow away the GB Talent IMO.Speedway is no longer about having to ride in GB ,it’s about riding in Poland and on the Continent.

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7 hours ago, gbrussell said:

. I would say Zagar and NKI are past it...........old stagers who in a lot of cases are just basically clogging up the field. 

But these old stagers can still teach the young ones a lesson. Zagar, even though he had already quailed for next year was still giving it some welly, he got a semi place over the 8 rounds. NKI and Lindback have had a bad year generally, NKI getting injured very early on. Ok, Lindback performed particularly poor this year. I don’t expect to see either in the GPs again. Zagar can still be a spoiler, but couple years and he may well be missing.

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8 hours ago, Col said:

Michelsen in fairness to him was a last minute replacement for Smolinski. He didn't have a winter to prepare mentally, financially or mechanically for being a GP rider. He will never be a World Champion but I'm not convinced Thomsen is better.

That is true and let’s not forget Smolinski was a last minute replacement for Hancock too. I’d say Thomsen is better, not by a massive amount but better nonetheless. Polish averages would seemingly agree too. 

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I don’t understand all these calls for more younger new faces. The GP series is suppose to be the best 15 riders in the world, some of these older riders are still up there.

In reality it’s the top 10 who retain their place each year and if a rider finishes in top 10 they deserve it IMO. The only reason they have the number lower is to create some drama.

Liking the look of next years series, the only disappointment is Kasprzak but he qualified in dodgy circumstances.

I’d personally prefer it if only 2 qualified from GP challenge (not that it would have helped this year).

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Decent looking line up. The biggest disapointment was Grigori Laguta not qualifying out of the GP challenge earlier this year, as he would be fantastic in the GPs and really cause a stir! Berntzon is abit boring and KK is ermmm... well KK is KK! Thomsen has been fantastic in the second half of this year so he's more than earned his call up IMO.

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6 minutes ago, Najjer said:

Decent looking line up. The biggest disapointment was Grigori Laguta not qualifying out of the GP challenge earlier this year, as he would be fantastic in the GPs and really cause a stir! Berntzon is abit boring and KK is ermmm... well KK is KK! Thomsen has been fantastic in the second half of this year so he's more than earned his call up IMO.

Grigory certainly didn’t look interested after his bad 1st ride in Challenge. Dont think he wants a place.

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Substitutes:

1. Aleksandr Loktaev
2. Jaimon Lidsey
3. Dominik Kubera
4. Oleg Mihailov
5. Dan Bewley
6. Lukas Fienhage
7. Jan Kvech

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