Marksman

Here's a few 1 to 1 scale comparisions I had a play with, placing the new track on top of existing ones Redcar.. A fair bit bigger and wider than Redcar. Belle Vue.. Fits inside the dimensions, looks slightly wider perhaps but tighter corners Sheffield.. Tighter bends, but much much wider. And Plymouth.. Basically the whole of the Centre Green would fit the Plymouth Track with a bit of Room to spare!!

Already on the website if you look hard enough.. Going to be a really strong team!

Maybe get 2 for the price of 1 on one of these days #bros

Hopefully, should be some very good meetings between the 2 next year, maybe even multiple times if only 6 teams run! Both teams looking strong from 1 to 7.

It's looking like a 3pm start for the Speedway, so unfortunately other local amatuer sport like RL and Cricket will clash.

19 in January! https://workingtoncomets.com/riders/elliot-kelly/ I'd have a wild guess that this could be the team.. Connor Bailey 8.86 Sam McGurk 5.38 Luke Crang 7.23 Ace Pijper 6.90 Harry McGurk 7.11 Elliot Kelly 3.30 Luke Harrison 3.00 41.78

Jake Mulford won't be back at Belle Vue with signing for Redcar, maybe he will be an option, Redcar friday night, Workington Sat afternoon.

I saw on the final averages that have been published, Roynon's average is only 6.00. No brainer for me! https://britishspeedway.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/ndl22_issue_final.pdf

Was that the Local star or speedway star?

I think alot might depend on the other clubs running 2 teams wanting it. Leicester and Belle Vue for example would also have 12 PL home meetings, plus 2/3 KO Cup potentially. That would leave them with a mighty 30+ Home meetings including the NL ones (2 x Home). Oxford, Berwick, Edinburgh, Plymouth would also have similar issues, as the creation of this new Group comp. + KO Cup includes extra meetings. So they could also be hitting 30+ Home meetings with NL x2 at Home. This would be without any double headers taking places of course, not too sure how common they are now? On the other hand for us, Kent and Mildenhall, the summer would be very light on meetings if there are only 7/8 Home league meetings. For the Comets, this might mean filing the season up with Challenge meetings or others. For the new venture to be very successful, I think we would need regular weekly meetings (to an extent). Going 5 or 6 weeks without a Home meeting for example, which i've seen at some clubs this year, wouldn't be great.

The team will be called Workington Comets, northside is just the location/venue name (within Workington). And a name a lot of people within speedway will know because of the previous training track From having a dig around, The BSPL have already quietly added the new team and track info to the site... https://britishspeedway.co.uk/team/workington-comets/

Key point from this mornings AGM statement

Steve posted an update on his twitter yesterday, back straight looks ready for those seats now

I see that Town's fixtures are now out for next season, and they seem to have reverted back to a 3pm start, only 7 of 10 would be inside the Speedway season it seems, 12pm starts perhaps?

Sounds very promising! I guess when it went in 2018, no one would of predicted us even talking about a return, remarkable. Just my thoughts of course, but Speedway, especially for this new venture, should be ran in the summer/warmer months, unlike the shambles that descended the '22 Championship season. That leaves us with something like this... (in an ideal world, that doesn't exist) 17 Weekends, Running May to End of August; 9 Home League meetings (KL possibly joining) 1 Home KO Meeting Individual Meeting 3 more Sundays...? NDLRC or Pairs? British youth championship round Under 19 final / Under 21 Semi final? Means 14/17 weekends running speedway, giving room for rain offs etc. However of course, rider availabilty will always be a problem at this level, more so the opposition! Then run into September if team progresses in League playoffs / KO Final etc.

Hope this happens, the NL could be the most populated league next year with 10 teams if the Comets and KL both join. Maybe even IOW will be ready to return

Looks like whoever set up the new Scorpions Instagram account has already revealed the 7 riders by following them all…

Interesting news this morning, a few of the Championship clubs run their own streaming already. Hopefully this new network is a collaborative effort.

Hopefully the NDL playoffs on BSN will be well supported, the service has been a breath of fresh air for an nomad fan like myself. Hopefully will see you covering a meeting at Northside, Workington next season!

Yeah it would make sense start off small and build it up, run in the NDL and make money on track hire, other events etc. However, looks like there could be as few as 7 in the championship next year IF Glasgow were to have a go in the Premiership. I’m sure if that was the case the BSPL would be asking the possibility of Workington joining the Championship. Afternoon racing in the NDL, with trackdays, the British youth championship and a few Open meetings with star names is probably along the lines of what will happen in 2023.

Found this nice drone footage someone has taken in August on YouTube, really shows off the track and it's surronding area... The BSPL AGM will be fast approaching with the NL AGM to follow later on I think, may hear some more news soon.

Who is the australian on co-comms please? I missed the start.

Kelvin Tatum has a new podcast out with Dan talking about his 2 GP wins and the new track at Northside... "I think it could potentially be the best racetrack in the world" "It's like Belle Vue with some character" https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/dan-bewley/id1641594866?i=1000578057860

SGP practice is on Friday at 3pm, I'd imagine they both want to get as much time as possible on the track at Cardiff, especially for Brennan who is riding in the main SGP2 meeting on the Sunday. They'll both get much more out of being at Cardiff for 3 days than riding in a Championship pairs meeting...

Just getting round to replying to this now and have some thoughts.. I think a 12pm start on a Sunday would be a good idea if floodlights weren't available to the site early days. There is certainly a lot less to compete with on a Sunday and the idea of getting the punters money in first is a great one. The only problem I see with Sundays is getting a meeting in before the Rugby starts at Derwent Park, they've kicked off at 2pm for a couple of seasons now, so it doesn't give fans much hope of attending both if it was a 12pm start. I don't know how much of a goer an 11am start would be given the travelling distances involved. Town moved kick off forward to 2pm because they were seeing people stay away to watch the 4pm 'Super Sunday' kick off on TV, usually involving Man Utd or Liverpool. Doesn't take much for people to stay away these days! Running Saturday wouldn't be a great idea in my opinion, I always said this in the later days of the last Comets era. Times changed and the die hards would go as it was our ritual but easy for the casuals to stay away. The promotion obviously tried with Fridays, but didn't work out mainly due to things out of their control as we know... There is/was always too much to compete with on Saturdays now whether that be any kind of general family commitments (weddings/birthday parties/general events etc.) I would guess it's also far more likely for someone to be at work on a Saturday than on a Sunday if you were to question a wide range of people for example. All popular local amateur summer sport is ran on saturdays too such as rugby league and cricket, both of which get fairly large followings with many different teams around the county. Carlisle United also have a large west cumbrian following if they are at home on a Saturday afternoon, albeit it has limited crossover with the Speedway season.