MattK
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Posts posted by MattK
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15 minutes ago, DC2 said:Swindling?
Hmmm .... are those dodgy Swindon supporters?
Freudian slip? Or should that be Fraudian slip? I'll get my coat.
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On 3/10/2020 at 3:11 PM, Wolfsbane said:Speedway will have no problems. Outdoor sport in the open air with very little crowding.
Can speedway afford to put any of their swindling supporter base at risk though?
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39 minutes ago, RobMcCaffery said:I strongly suspect that the people buying houses were told not to worry since the stadium was on its way out and now they realise that's not the case. They were foolish if they believed it. No doubt if this goes legal the truth will emerge.
I think you may be on the money here. Or at least told the stadium was "moving" without being told precisely where to or how far from its current position.
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1 hour ago, RobMcCaffery said:But it's in the same place!
But that's not the place it was supposed to be in - as in the original plans, for which the houses were built, the stadium was supposed to move.
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1 hour ago, charlie17 said:Dress it up with jargon as much as you like. We were told at the start the new old stadium would not be demolished before the new one was operational.
With the developers previous record everybody with half a brain could see this situation happening.This was plainly a lie and SBC are 100% are at fault.Who told you that? The local MP? There's a well know saying, how do you know when a politician is lying ?You can see their lips move. As I said, the council should have been smarter and put better checks in place, but even the limitation of no more than 200 houses being populated before contracts were signed was easily side stepped.
However, SBC are not 100% at fault. Gaming International are ultimately at fault as they had no intention of ever building the new stadium.
2 hours ago, charlie17 said:As far as the snow dome how many thousands of pounds was spent on a feasibility study , planning etc by the council?
Surely one of the first questions to be asked by the council is whether the developer has the money to go ahead with the project. If not then , as has been proved, it’s a complete waste of time.
That’s basic economics.I don't know, how much did the council spend on feasibility studies, planning etc.?
Development companies don't have £80m sat in the bank ready to invest. Once they get planning permission they go out to their investors and raise the capital requires to complete a project. If you look on Seven Capital's web site you will see they have a proven track record in retail, commercial and leisure developments. As I said, the council deserve criticism for many things, but I don't know how anyone can point the finger at them for the lack of progress.
44 minutes ago, charlie17 said:Matt.
You don’t happen to work for SBC by any chance?
Good Lord no.
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1 hour ago, charlie17 said:So Matt K are you saying if the speedway stadium does not go ahead SBC are not culpable at all and it will all be down to the developer?
Ultimately, the developers are culpable. It's their land and their development, their plan etc. They have chosen to build the houses first, endlessly tinker with the stadium plans and so on. The council should have put better checks in place to prevent the houses going up and no work on the stadium.
However, if you want a more comprehensive answer, the land around the stadium was designated as commercial use in the North Swindon Plan and bought by Motorola. Of course, Motorola not only didn't develop the land, but moved out of Swindon altogether. In reality, the council shouldn't have granted permission for houses on the land around the stadium, but money talks and local councils are under huge pressure from central government to build housing, so it was probably inevitable.
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48 minutes ago, charlie17 said:So another much vaunted project in the hands of Swindon Borough Council is not going to happen. The much anticipated indoor ski slope.
Along with the new football stadium, which has been talked about for the last 30 years and the renovation of the few historic buildings which Swindon has, it ain’t happening.
What price the Speedway Stadium? You can release as many computer generated pictures you like.
How is the North Star Snoasis "in the hands" of SBC? It is a private development being built and funded with private money. Or not as the case may be.
I'm all in favour of holding the council to account where appropriate, but I'm not sure what more they can do to move this forwards.
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1 hour ago, hans fan said:They have been known to doctor photos and make up lies lies lies. times have changed 25 years a go owners trainers use to put dogs to sleep Without hesitation i don’t know anybody now A few bad apples shouldn’t stop the sport .all greyhounds are not suitable for rehoming most are the best companions you’ll ever have last one I had was 40kg would lick anybody to death . lie about all day on sofa and be happy as pig in muck but as soon as it was walked see another dog or any animal you would think it was a wild lion sadly at 6 1/2 years he got cancer and had to be put down
The Greyhound Board of Great Britain release their own report stating 1,000 dogs died in a single year, including 242 put down trackside and 324 which were put down because they could not be rehomed. This is only dogs which "retire" it doesn't include those which were being trained but were not considered suitable.
A report compiled for the Irish Greyhound Board concluded that on average 5,987 dogs were culled (slide 26) each year as they "failed to produce qualifying times" (2,673); "failure to produce desired entry level times" (1,989) and an "unacceptable decline in performance" (1,326).
Why would the greyhound governing bodies spread such lies about their own sports?
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On 12/24/2019 at 3:37 PM, lucifer sam said:Iris, don't believe everything you read in the papers. Especially when it comes from the animal rights brigade.
I've been a part-owner of a greyhound, which was treated very well by the trainer and then looked after he retired by one of the other families involved. Plus there's a whole Greyhound Trust in the UK which doesn't exist in e.g. Ireland.
You don't need to read "the papers".
The Greyhound Board of Great Britain release their own report stating 1,000 dogs died in a single year, including 242 put down trackside and 324 which were put down because they could not be rehomed. This is only dogs which "retire" it doesn't include those which were being trained but were not considered suitable.
A report compiled for the Irish Greyhound Board concluded that on average 5.987 dogs were culled (slide 26) each year as they "failed to produce qualifying times" (2,673); "failure to produce desired entry level times" (1,989) and an "unacceptable decline in performance" (1,326).
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9 hours ago, tyretrax said:Some people swalow what the antis spout like dogs being euthanized using captive bolt guns and kennels having freezers for dead dogs, why would they want to keep them?
Thank you for highlighting this despicable behaviour. I had never heard of these actions until you pointed them out. Here is some more reading for those who don't want to "swalow [sic] what the antis spout".
Greyhound killer to face tougher sentence
QuoteA builders' merchant who today admitted killing and burying thousands of former racing greyhounds on land near his home is to be sentenced at a crown court after magistrates said they could not impose a sufficiently severe penalty.
He was accused of slaughtering the animals using a bolt gun and disposing of the carcasses behind his home.
30 injured greyhounds put down at dog track
QuoteThe statistics were provided by Liverpool University which carries out research into making the sport safer. It receives dogs from the stadium and remains of animals from owners for further study.
Officials told the M.E.N. that in the last 12 months, their scientists had received 33 dogs from the stadium – 31 of these were put to sleep because of injury and the two others put down because of aggressive behaviour.
Greyhound breeder offers slow dogs to be killed for research
QuoteThe largest breeder of greyhounds in Britain is offering to sell healthy young dogs to be killed and dissected for research, an investigation has found.
Charles Pickering told an undercover reporter that his breeding programme continually throws up dozens of “fit and healthy” dogs that are “just a bit too slow for the tracks” and therefore a financial burden to him.
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16 hours ago, 1 valve said:Nothing. So long as the first part of the agreement was first fully complied with. I.e refurbishment of the stadium and suitable long term future use irrevocably established as specified.
It depends what the clauses are. All along the council have been adamant that no houses can be built on the land. Now they have opened the door the houses on the car park I see no reason why the current owners would sell. At very least they'll want to see what stipulations are required for the stadium to be considered "operable" in order for planning permission to be granted.
It also massive complicates a CPO as the council have massively increased the value of the car park simply by weakening their opposition towards housing.
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3 hours ago, 1 valve said:Because planning permission etc would only be granted subject to an agreeable & binding long term future of stadium & associated activities being finalised & implemented?
What's to stop the current owners complying with the above now the council have opened the door to homes being built on part of the stadium land?
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16 hours ago, lucifer sam said:The main-money will come from the 100 homes included as part of the plans, that's for sure. But if it's used to leverage speedway and greyhounds back, that can only be positive. Both sports are much missed in Oxford, and have been well represented in any public meeting.
Why would the current owners sell if there was a quick £10m to be made flipping the car park into houses?
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17 hours ago, iris123 said:1,000 Greyhounds died or were killed in 2018!!!! Does that tell the whole story ? Certainly give ammo to peta
That figure sounds like the tip of the iceberg
Up to 6,000 greyhounds are being killed each year because they are not fast enough.
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39 minutes ago, Daniel Smith said:Then I'd say the idea os a dead rubber then, greyhounds is a more extinct sport than Speedway. Great shame the project is doomed for failure before it's even got going.
Maybe Budimir is planning exactly that so the grounds become impossible to prove that sport has any chance of survival and apply for planning on the whole ground for many more £m's than the redevelopment of the stadium.
A free hit for Budimir
It does seem strange that anyone would invest £20m into a decrepit stadium which plays host to two sports in terminal decline.
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59 minutes ago, Daniel Smith said:Rob, if I was you, I'd speak with Budimir and try and get plans done for the inclusion of Stocks, Hot Rods & Bangers on an all shale surface and rip out the dogs. You're unfortunately on a losing campaign if the continuation is Greyhounds is the only option.
Isn't Nick Budimir primarily involved in greyhound racing? It would seem a strange approach to buy a stadium and then drop the one thing he has a background in.
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Let teams build to whatever average they like, then for each meeting the difference forms a handicap for the team with the higher average. For example, Swindon builds to 45 and Sheffield builds to 40. Therefore Swindon start on -5 when they ride against Sheffield at Sheffield and -10 (to account for the home advantage) at Swindon.
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20 minutes ago, f-s-p said:I could have written that!
Only thing I see different is the scrapping of SWC. It was too expensive and not enough countries could do it anymore. Smaller teams, less expensive was the only way to go...
Is SWC dead and SoN now the annual event?
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37 minutes ago, screm said:As for the scoring system as others have said if its not broke why fix it, one of the beauties about SGP is that every race counted towards you total at the end of the night now it doesn't which makes no sense at all to me.
Who says it isn't broken though? Maybe the organisers have looked at some of the lacklustre attendances and figure this is one way things can be freshened up a bit?
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I don't mind the new scoring system. As said, it is in line with other motorsports. You don't get more points for winning an F1 GP by a minute rather than a fraction of a second.
As for only the top six qualifying and five wildcards, I like this a lot as it gives the organisers much more flexibility. Hopefully they use this to inject some fresh faces, rather than simply promote the seventh and eighth placed riders though. Personally, I don't think any GP rider who finishes outside the top eight/six should get a wildcard unless they've missed meeting through injury.
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1 hour ago, mikebv said:And the great news is that there are tens of thousands of 40/50/60 somethings out there who will either have used to go, or know somebody who still does..
You'd think, wouldn't you? The problem is that speedway's actually quite a hard sell. Four blokes going round in circles with most races won from the gate. And it costs £18. Not really an inciting proposition on the face of it.
Trying to attract back lost fans makes a lot of sense.
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13 hours ago, Skidder1 said:Is it really a 'family sport'? In all honesty how many 'families' do actually attend these days - and how regularly?
If its the 'Peaky Blinders' audience that we're going for then the sport needs spicing up a whole lot more, with much more convoluted aggro between teams.......!!
You've identified one of the fundamental problems with British speedway - it doesn't understand who its target market is.
Speedway tries to target children by doing into schools, having face painting and bouncing castles, but when you actually go to a meeting the average age is over 55 and the presentation is like something from the 70s. Kids don't want to listen to AC/DC and fill out paper programmes with a pen, they want Stormzy, Fortnite and an app to keep score with.
The solution is in fact quite simply. If the majority of your customers are over 55, then market speedway at... wait for it... yep... over 55s! Its not rocket science people. You can also align the sport with sponsors who want to target that demographic adding some much needed credibility.
The other benefit of course is that over 55s are likely to have far more disposable income than youngsters.
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42 minutes ago, DC2 said:Gin. The emperor’s new clothes of marketing.
Whether you infuse it with rhubarb, raspberry or botanicals, it still tastes of ..... wait for it ...... tonic water!
And then some insist on Fever Tree rather than Schweppes!!! Why? Is it more tonicky?
What a load of cobblers.
Of course it's cobblers, but that's marketing in a nutshell. Doesn't make it wrong though.
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10 minutes ago, Sings4Speedway said:plenty of old school things have made remarkable comebacks like real ale, cider & gin as you stated so watch out Sherry will be next....you heard it here first
What you will note is, although those things have regained popularity, it isn't branded or marketed in the same way as when it was popular previously. Gin has regained popularity by targeting young drinkers, selling itself as a premium drink and coupled with exotic mixers.
This is the problem with speedway. The world has moved on but the sport hasn't. Promoters idea of marketing hasn't changed since the 70s and still involves going into schools and down the local village fete. The other problem speedway faces is that is it a premium price for a spit and sawdust product. That is a hard sell in anyone's book.
I think too many promoters are sitting around thinking "speedway will be next" - however, they've been doing that for the last twenty years.
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Corona virus
in Speedway News and Discussions
Posted
As you say, it is estimated that up to 10,000 are infected but are not displaying symptoms (the incubation period is 5 days) or experience mild symptoms. The problem is these people are still contagious and are infecting others as they go about their daily lives.
There is a lot of focus on the death rate, however it is a bit more complex than that. For example, figures from China suggest that 20% of those who contract the virus require hospital treatment. Reports from Italy suggest their healthcare system in the north is at breaking point with not enough isolation rooms in hospitals to avoid infection of other patients and healthcare workers and shortages of ventilation machines and respirators.
Another slightly ironic issue in Italy is that even before the outbreak they had a shortage of around 3,000 intensive care professionals. Now where have we heard about healthcare worker shortages before?