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mikebv

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Posts posted by mikebv

  1. Posted

    19 minutes ago, heathen52 said:

    Seems Osborne is one step ahead as usual.

    https://www.swindonadvertiser.co.uk/news/24163955.application-drop-speedway-greyhounds-abbey-stadium/

    The council are hiding behind the "complex, technical difficulties around consent,"...

    Writing is on the wall..

    All parties involved have known where this ends for a long, long time...

    And, given hardly a ripple of protest, they probably feel that now is the time to finalise everything..

    It would be interesting to see what would happen if some promoter (or maybe all the BSP), came out and said that they would promote the sport there to see how it went...

    "Finish the stadium, as per the agreement for building the houses, and we will run Speedway there"...

     

    • Like 1

  2. Posted

    7 minutes ago, martinmauger said:

    Think the speedway version is: 'a track in a field with a fence around it & a few Potakabins', bit like when Scunny first started up in 2005/2006.  Still, little acorns & all that....

    A decent track with somewhere to watch the racing from, and somewhere to get the basic food and drink offering...

    That is the starting point for me I would say...

    Its not like die hard fans have been used to much "opulence" over the years which could dissuade many to not attend..

     

  3. Posted

    Good interview in this weeks edition with Phil Morris..

    All 49 riders will be attending the launch of the ssason press day..

    Hopefully more collective selling of the brand is the plan as we go forward..

    About time, if so...

     

    • Like 1

  4. Posted

    43 minutes ago, Neila said:

    Was a good suggestion/idea made on a Facebook post about press and practice day, that the 7th rider could be unveiled after riding round by taking his crash helmet off like the masked singer TV show  take it off take it off and the 7th rider is ----------‐------ Steve lawson B)

    I like that idea...

    Could do the same with guests...

    Now, I get the "surprise" will invariably be Bomber, but on an odd occasion it would be someone else...:D

    • Haha 1

  5. Posted

    17 minutes ago, THE DEAN MACHINE said:

    Osbourne has not broken the law, the planning conditions mean diddly squat when you are experienced in getting round them of which Osbourne is, hence that’s why he has carried on with Swindon regardless completely ignoring and planning conditions,councillors say one thing and do another, I have seen this twice in the last 2 months where a councillor has said one thing in a meeting and in the presss and then done exactly the opposite behind the everyone’s back, Swindon’s problem is the council not Osbourne, they have the power, do they use that power ? 

    And when you get met with almost zero coordinated, organised protests, then "fair play" to Osbourne as he can take it that...

    1. Hardly anyone from the fanbase cares...

    And. 2. (And possibly most important of alll) the promoters of Swindon and the wider BSP, seem to let him happily do what he wants....

    Can't blame him to be honest...

    • Like 1

  7. Posted

    1 hour ago, THE DEAN MACHINE said:

    You need 4 helmets cause god forbid you have to change a helmet colour between races and a rack to hang them on, a fridge for you energy drinks cause as we know health and fitness is important these days and nothing says health better than energy drinks and don’t forget your tin of snus, multiple clutch coolers and one special person to hold one infront of your face,  think it’s a matter of time before one rider has his music decks in his pit bay so he can “drop a few tracks”to help him relax before his races, you need to one member of your crew who arranged a flight to another track to stand there making sure he is in every TV shot, he has no mechanical knowledge whatsoever and doesn’t do a damn thing but when it is pointed out to him he has a list of excuses why he should be there, it goes on and on, maybe I was wrong?  each rider should have 20 pit crew each 

    And someone walking around the pits shouting...

    "Does anyone need methanol?"!!!!;)

  10. Posted · Edited by mikebv

    3 hours ago, False dawn said:

    I was waiting for that one. :rolleyes:

    But seriously. You have to admire the bloke. He was riding for the Rest of the World on Saturday, in California.
    For anyone just thinking of going tonight, you should. These meetings are always interesting. The Q&A session in particular.

    It was an empty net, central position, two yards out....:D

    He is a proper legend when it comes never letting anyone down..

    (And must be due at least a couple of dozen league winners medals combined from both leagues)..;)

    Edit: And the same amount of runners up medals too for the same seasons..!!:D

    • Like 1

  12. Posted

    1 hour ago, BluPanther said:

    Bomber rode for two teams in the 2023 play offs, maybe he can make it three in 2024. And lets not forget that Lambert will no doubt rock up for someone again for a lovely big end of season payday...

    Cannot happen, as it has been decreed that Bomber (or anyone else), could only ride for ONE team in the play offs, if his own doesnt make it..

    Seemingly last years play off situation has been reviewed and we now have the new regulation...

    Perfectly acceptable...:D

    Some, however, still dont take this sport too seriously...;)

     

    • Like 2

  13. Posted

    1 hour ago, iainb said:

    Yes, I was thinking that myself. Even if you adjust for inflation it doesn't seem rust much more than what is reportedly being paid today

    It was a "paid for" 3hr (when it first launched), advert...

    What an opportunity given the size of the business (very small in real terms)..

    Hardly anyone knows who you are even in the area where you trade, and you go out on TV for 9 hours (with the two repeats), at all times of the day..

    And you get paid for this advert!!

    You can advertise nationally, as well a locally, your product..

    Instead, we had promoters moaning that the crowds dropped..

    Rather than fixing the many self inflicted reasons why they did..

    And making these nights "unmissable" on, and off, the track..

  14. Posted

    On 2/10/2024 at 8:20 AM, Matt Davis said:

    Does anyone know how much the Sky deal was for? What kind of numbers are we talking here?

    I seem to remember £110k per club (10 teams), and £5k (maybe £10k?) a match that got televised, to cover any drop in crowd/reduction in admission fee to attract a crowd in..

    One promoter, post Sky money, said the up front cash basically paid for the No1 riders..

    Who all effed off when the money dried up...

  16. Posted

    4 hours ago, uk_martin said:

    Not forgetting that only 60% of the Sky money ever reached the sport. The other 40% was Terry Russel's, er,  "commission"  

    Nice pay day in the era when Sky Sports had cash to splash and were glad to have every sport in the country harboured under their umbrella. 40% for pushing against an open door. And the rest of the sport were mugs enough to just accept that.

    Wasn't it 20% "finder's fee"?

    To be fair to him, no one else "pushed against that open door", and all got well over a six figure guarantee each season for many years...

    What they actually did with that money sadly is the legacy....

    • Like 1

  18. Posted

    2 hours ago, E I Addio said:

    I think there is much more to it than that. Sitting in a freezing cold stadium for two months of a six months season is not going to get modern punters through the doors, especially the times when you are 30 minutes into the meeting and have only run maybe three or four races due to delays.  Most people have fairly comfortable homes these days and a variety of TV channels and choices. It’s not like the ‘50’s when people had at best poorer quality homes and BBC only on TV. No incentive to stay at home in those days. And all that is before we even get to what goes on at the track . Dog racing is the same. There were around 40 dog tracks  in London alone in the ‘40’s and 50’s but only one I think left today. People just don’t want that sort of stadium based entertainment anymore.

    In many ways the sport has shot itself in the foot but I very much doubt whether it would even be big again in the modern world but even if the sport got its act together

    . I think less and less people want that sort of entertainment. 

    All working independently to try and win something that they themselves devalue to the point of almost worthlessness, (by their own operating model) is almost madness isnt it? 

    Laughable if it wasn't so sad to see the negative impact that the operating model has had on crowds..

    Maybe one day they will pool resources, put up some big prize money, and relaunch the sport collectively with some professional marketeers involved..

    Or maybe they wont....

    • Like 1

  19. Posted · Edited by mikebv

    Watched it again on YT not long ago..

    A lack of a clear vision of travel as to where they saw the sport was the ultimate issue, which meant non stop short term fix, after short term fix..

    The Sky millions being the huge opportunity missed...

    Using that money for example could have allowed squad systems, which would have meant Mickey Mouse didnt have any control over the sport, and the titles then had credibility...

    And who knows, maybe could have attracted  sponsors from "outside" its fanbase..

    Instead the sport paid out "the Sky money" to No1's, who then missed the most meetings as the GP's evolved hugely at that time, meaning credibility destroying guestfests after guestfests with inferior riders replacing them, thus peeing off the public..

    A public who then got inflation busting increases to admission prices to not only pay for the level of riders, but also to cover the shortfall from disillusioned fans leaving the sport annually...

    Those left, ultimately paying more to watch less quality as the GP riders had to be "elsewhere" many weeks..

    UK Speedway basically bent over backwards to the top riders, often, it appeared so the promoters could bask in the reflective glory of rubbing shoulders with them..

    And then of course when the money stopped the No1's showed their loyalty and appreciation to the promoters by foxtrotting and oscaring as quickly as those planes to Poland and Sweden could carry them..

    And only came back when the schedule was changed to accommodate their wishes..

    Even so many years later, 2024 will see rinse and repeat..

    Still no clear direction of travel..

    Still no clear leadership..

    Still no "outside" sponsorship nor major businesses interested in sponsoring the league or individual clubs..

    More opportunities for guest riders though, so, you know, not all bad eh? :D

     

  20. Posted

    34 minutes ago, B.V 72 said:

    To me speedway is a sport and in sport you play/ride to win. I love close plenty of passing races as we all do. But if its my team that are getting passed great race or not i am still pi**ed off. I also go home feeling a lot happier if my team has won.

    Its why the play offs pull in much better crowds meaningless silverware or not fans want/hope to see there team win something it makes people happy.

    The play offs definitely pull in many fans like me, who are not too bothered about who actually wins or not...

    It provides many "followers" with a night out at a speedway meeting that actually has decent crowds and, therefore, atmosphere...

    A bit of a throwback to how it used to be when we all started to follow the sport and loved it....

    I really enjoyed both meetings last year I attended that the Aces were in, with good crowds at both Ipswich and the NSS..

    Peterborough's Captain then turning up for Sheffield so they could defeat Ipswich in the Final, (after he had made such a fundamental impact in putting Ipswich in the Final), summed up perfectly why you shouldn't take league UK racing too seriously.. 

    An excellent night out are the play offs...

     

    • Like 3

  21. Posted

    5 hours ago, FishersGate said:

    That's fine for you but I don't think many Poole, Belle Vue, Glasgow fans etc will be happy seeing there team lose every week. You should have seen how much the crowds dropped at leicester when we got battered every week..soon as we started winning again crowds slowly rised.

    The difference nowadays is that there is actually some world class talent that will be visiting virtually every time you have a meeting...

    A bit of a novelty maybe, and short term potential rather than a long term sustainable plan, but, in Brums case in particular, it may offer some breathing space to go again next year, even if this years team doesnt trouble the play offs..

    • Like 1

  23. Posted

    3 hours ago, Pauldoveyspeedway said:

    Once they start  losing  at home the fans will start to drop off...

    Which would be a crying shame given the money the promoter has put in, and the lack of any real kudos in winning the league anyway...

    Lets hope the novelty of having the likes of Tai, Emil, Dan et al, will keep the Brum fans turning up in sufficient numbers to keep the finances on a reasonably even keel...

  24. Posted

    14 minutes ago, Biffa said:

    Since when? Thought it was programmed rides only?

    The usual BSF debate topic.. :D...

    Ht 15 counts....

    Hence Pawlicki, who will come up against the other No1 a possible, (probable) 3 times per meeting, will do well to deliver 10 points from his usual five rides to hit an 8 point average..

    Especially when you add in a probable 3 races against some of the No5's on show this year...

     

  25. Posted · Edited by mikebv

    Both Pawlicki and Milik are riding one position up from where ideally they should be..

    And there isn't a "natural No 3" behind them..

    And Brum will know this...

    But at least they come to the tapes, and, hopefully will still be doing so when the season ends..

    Edit. They remind a bit of when the Aces had Stead at No1, you knew where the team would end up, but at least there was a track to visit...

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