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The late Danny Ayres was the master of celebration and that was one of the many reasons he was so popular. many riders said they wanted to honour his memory this year and for me the best way is to celebrate like Danny !!!

Don't consider how much rain has fell in Pardubice area over Fri and into Sat am. They done well to get the track into any shape to be able to race today.

This is why the guest rule is rubbish. Should have to run R/R and not just guests

Well its only my opinion having spent much of my working life in local events, hospitality and leisure industries. Even now retired, regular Friday/Saturday meetings would rule me out due to other obligations. To get families to bring their kids along to anything on a regular basis in this day and age would be remarkable for any popular event/activity let alone speedway. For holidaymakers it is well known that Fri/Sat is 'changeover day' for hotels/guest houses, campsites etc. A midweek fixture is traditionally much easier for holiday makers to plan into their week's stay!

Well Brum offered Berwick to change the dates like Edinburgh and Newcastle did but Berwick declined so what could Brum do apart from choose guests which they were entitled to do

First match of the season. 6 man Berwick team 39 Championship Select 51 And this is supposed to be a professionally run sport!!!!

The figures given for attendances at football matches have nothing to do with how many people are in the stadium.. Many times teams like Arsenal have quoted figures as a full house yet you can see it is not three-quarters full as many clubs include season ticket holders whether they go to the match or not.

Looks like Anders Rowe at the moment.

Go to Asda nice salad bowl with Dandelion juice. Your arteries will appreciate it more.

For the first time in years, GB is looking like it has three quality riders. Bewley a way to go to catch up with Tai and Lambert but heading in the right direction.

Forecast for tomorrow looking good.

1: 56.07 - 2: awarded - 3: 56.64 - 4: 55.95 (track record by 0.04s) - 5: 55.08 (track record) - 6: 56.08 - 7: 56.38 - 8: 57.82 - 9: 56.38 - 10: 57.61 - 11: 58.32

How do you police it though? Put a lot of trust on those who only want to watch the first match and hope they leave?

Certainly seems to have worked for Leicester if the attendances quoted on their thread are accurate.. ie drop down, stop paying out for GP riders and stop having to ride mid week to accommodate them. Net result? Larger crowds at weekends watching (due to the amount of DU's), a great many of exactly the same riders they would have seen riding anyway if they had stayed at the 'top level'..

Saturday night at Wimborne Road would be great. Certainly attract away fans and neutrals.

Message from club

What is the point of all the moaning? Embrace what we have to work with. The only other option was to shut for this year and probably for good.

The sooner he is packed off back down under for good the better if this is what he's doing, no consideration for the paying public regardless of whether or not the club are content for him to do it. I've never liked his attitude to speedway anyway, too many times he's moaned about track conditions when others have just gone out and raced, good riddance to him when he's gone. I'd much rather watch the likes of Tom Brennan giving it their all than some lazy Aussie who doesn't give a toss.

to be fair mask wearing outside is pointless and not required by law. It seems local councils have been given powers to make their own rules up which is never a good idea as most of them are totally clueless and that comes from dealing with my local council lol

Schroeck used to come out with the same nonsense when he was TM at Rye House. Awful TM who is afraid to take reserves out of rides and completely miss T/S opportunities.

Exactly that, it’s not Birmingham’s fault but it’s the system that is the problem. I’ve said it many times over the course of the winter but it’s blatantly obvious now that the system should of been changed to be 6 man teams. There is absolutely nothing to be gained by 7 man teams with guests galore everywhere.

At UK level I don't think it is even supposed to be that anymore.. Lets be honest, this season the promoters can hide behind the pandemic and the fans will cut them lots of slack given how long they have been without speedway.. The reality of course is that much of what will happen this season will have happened pandemic or not.. As that is simply the way they choose to run things..

You got that one wrong Mr Brightside

Lahti i was referring to

With quite a few teams already race on a saturday there could be quite few blanks in the home fixture list .plus the fact two posters have said stadia uk dont want us there anyway I'm sure stadia uk got idea's of there own especially at weekends .

Only a fag paper in it, great meeting for Dan, decent meeting all round, enjoyed it. Note to self, Don't predict easy heat wins again, ever.

I’ll be there Steve. In my seat on the home straight. Looking forward to your match report afterwards I’ll provide the balanced one later ....

You tube up and running https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AX6cXZWSQ8Q

speedway riders are one of the more accessible in professional sports and with social media it's the sort of thing that riders should be making the most of, that's how sponsors get involved a lot of the time .. even big companies look at things like this, it's how to get noticed. i know when i was at Canterbury i would chat with supporters, get involved with things and have a laugh with them, i got some cool sponsors that way, supporters paying points money, and friends for life too

Thought the streaming worked well with just a few glitches when sound was lost. Michael Max was excellent as co-presenter and it was nice to see Nigel Pearson travelling up to the track to also help. Annoyingly the weather forecast which had been accurate for most of the week got it wrong with steady light rain, then heavy rain falling in the evening at a time when it was meant to be light cloud! With the track already wet and it being the coldest May in Scotland for 40+years, the track just didn't have a chance to dry out. Remarkably the track record was broken twice during the evening. All of the Tigers had their moments with Sam Jensen being very impressive. Unfortunately Tom Bacon crashed out, hope he's ok, reducing Kent to a 5 man team using R/R and IRR which made it really difficult for them. It would be interesting to know how many people tuned in and whether streaming could become part of the new normal.

Definitely something clubs should look at, especially away fans. Myself, when Berwick were on tour, I would be interested in wathing if other teams streamed meetings.

In his first year at Lynn (2011) he passed riders for fun, never understood the ‘gating tart’ tag. There have been periods of his career when he had been returning from injury and understandably tentative but when fully fit and confident he can pass riders forcefully and gracefully.

I've seen before that with double headers, if you only want to see the first meeting, you pay for the two then get refunded for the second one on the way out. If you only want to see the second meeting you have to keep turnstiles open until the second meeting starts. Is that possible when you are dealing with an all ticket meeting? As always, there will be a reason why things are done a certain way. Also, on the subject of streaming the meeting, how many fans would choose the streaming option over attending if the weather wasn't great? Maybe the club would lose out that way? One possible way to solve that would be what Edinburgh did and put a block on the meeting being available to TD14 / TD15 postcodes and only available to other parts of the country.

Sunshine and clear blue sky just now. BBC weather video yesterday says dry and windy all day.

Are both matches being live streamed this evening? Berwick are missing a wind fall if not as lots of speedway starved fanatics out here hoping it is.

I will provide live updates from trackside here: https://live.baansportfansite.nl/event/457/ek-speedway-challenge-pardubice.html

From next Friday Premier Sports will be broadcasting some Friday meetings starting with Gorzow vs Torun

If they're allowed in!

Early summer = 1st June. Not long now

Gets a bad press for his passing does Bjerre... The last few years have seen him venture much wider and pass a fair few opponents... Saw him at the NSS regularly go round the opposition riders...

The call off of the meeting was to do with it raining all day nothing to do with reduce capacity. There’s no way the meeting could have gone ahead even if it was full capacity. As I’m aware the weather across the whole of the country has been wetter than the average May climate so I’d expect more to be cancelled due to the rain. Anybody speculating why the meeting was called off obviously live nowhere near the track.

Perhaps next year......

Should take some points off the Millar Brothers.

Sadly once the stock car catch fence went up there be came a bigger barrier between riders and fans watching through a bird cage ruined it for many at Kings Lynn and the kids that used to get a high 5 s after each successful race from the riders that all stopped - I no stock cars pay the bills at Kings Lynn but for many speedway fans it’s ruined the spectacle the catch fence the clay/soil based track rather than red shale that produced racing passing rather than gate and go - yes the stadium looks better but at what cost ?

As a matter of interest, when was the regulation that prohibited a Guest or RR facility being given for a rider that had never ridden for a club, removed from the rule book?

It is barmy isnt it? A sport whose leagues run with so little credibility and kudos, actually plan in to make it even less credible and give it even less kudos in winning.. And if anyone says "shortened season due to covid" then why run junior teams if fitting in first team meetings would be an issue this season.. Or.. Plenty of double headers with the junior team could have been replaced with two teams from their own league visiting.. What you often get when these meetings are planned in is "Team A" wanting the match on due to a 'weaker' "Team B", and "Team B" agreeing to it because they have lined up a track specialist ringer which actually can improve their chances. "Please take us seriously"...

hes had one meeting jesus .

Cricket has plenty of stats thrown at the viewer so maybe Speedway could do overall rider averages, home and away averages, their averages at individual tracks, % of race wins to races competed in etc etc. It could add another dimension to the viewer watching.. And provide discussion points in the breaks between races.. Poland now show how far and how fast the riders have rode and their reaction times... Anything that pricks interest has to be considered I would say..

Personally I think online sales only will effect attendances.Whilst I realise it may be necessary when attendances are limited, I feel Clubs have to get back to pay at the gate as quick as possible when allowed.Another downside is how many Online sites are also charging a booking fee,not much be said about that,but you can bet it will be happening in some cases.

Andy Hewlett?