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It was the right call, the forecast was horrendous. Anyway it’s raining in Alwalton now, not a lot, but it is raining. Riders often have a rain off guarantee written into their contracts (if they’re smart ) to cover any wasted travel costs should they arrive in the country before a meeting is postponed. It used to be (not sure if it still is) that if you call a meeting off post midday you still had to pay rent to the Showground. It can be very expensive to call a meeting off after midday. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

The hindsight weather forecasters will be disappointed to learn that it’s been chucking it down in Alwalton since 7:30pm.

The Poles have it right. Ring fencing their bottom two positions for U21 riders.. And that is in their top league as well as others.. The 2nd and 3rd tier over here should do the same with the top league, given a so called lack of riders, running six man teams of "established" riders Meaning a glide path to follow for the GB U21 riders into the top tier, and some surplus "established" riders for Div 1 replacements... Those "special U21 talents" eg Dan Bewley, could just simply be a Div 1 rider, which would also free up a place for "lesser lights" in lower leagues..

Reading what everyone is posting is very interesting how ironic that the club that has done this to a young English talent who was very good against my team last Tuesday is run by the person who is the chairman of British speedway I feel sorry for joe Thompson I really do.

Like you say they will be at the “Top Table” dominating the sport for many years to come.When you look at the Multinational and Conglomerates sponsorship involved in the backing of the sport other Countries have very little chance of competing financially at the top of the sport,and they are making sure that the best riders will be there in the future.When you see the presentation and the Media coverage they involve in EVERY meeting you can see why.Very Professional.Some of the racing might not be any better than GB,but the credibility is there to see.

You would like to think that it was also the "common sense" way of doing it.. Putting young lads up against some of the World's Top 10 without giving them the safety net of not being dropped is ludicrous to be honest.. Putting career pressure on young lads to score points against the likes of Doyle, Emil, Bewley, Fricke, and Holder simply helps no one, neither team, nor individual, nor watching fans.... I often hear Promoters bemoaning all the advantages the Poles have re their continued "conveyor belt of talent", and I get that owning their own tracks and/or having access to them at anytime is an advantage... But I can pretty much guarantee that if four U21 lads rode at 6 and 7 in every single 2nd and 3rd tier meeting that took place over here, with 3 rides a meeting each guaranteed like the Poles do, you would have a much larger "conveyor belt of talent" over here.. You could even add to the "ring fenced mix", those aged 21+ riders who are "newbies" to the sport, as some of top riders down the years didnt start riding Speedway till well into their 20's.. I thought the Covid break would have given those who run the sport a huge opportunity to implement the radical change in operating model that is so clearly required... Sadly they passed up the chance to move the sport forward long term, just like the promoters did when the Sky money was just used in the main to pay for GP riders, rather than increasing the awareness of the sport through marketing, and setting up a proper development programme for young riders.. Ring fencing four U21 lads per meeting to take a minimum collective 12 rides out of the 60 on offer, just may, (will), unearth GB riders to fill places in 1 to 5's down the line in the 3rd and 2nd tier's at the least.. And it also wont throw them in at the deep end without arm bands to help them float like currently can happen..

The Poole leg is still in the fixture list but Leicester need to sort out a new date for theirs. This feels familiar from last season!

Great post and is totally the right way to go

Don’t know why they would drop Thompson a promising young Brit to accommodate Clegg a journeyman reserve who has been round the block a few times.That’s GB Speedway though,all these so called training days then nothing at the end for the youngsters.The up and coming talent will be heading for Poland like the young Aussies,and giving the GB a miss in the future.

Call it off

Me to so the younger lads get to compete against there piers . Sport really missed a trick in 21 after Covid should have made huge changes for the future but sadly didn't. Never mind though we can always get a 27 year old Aussie in the NDL on a 3 point average and support it

The club is clearly following The Four Stage Strategy as explained in the first episode of Yes, Prime Minister - we're at 3.5 now: In stage one we say “nothing is going to happen” In stage two we say “something may be going to happen but we should do nothing about it” In stage three we say “maybe we should do something about it, but there’s nothing we can do” In stage four we say “maybe there’s something we could have done, but it’s too late now”

Unlucky but don’t think it would have made much difference to be honest.Alcock talks a good story but doesn’t produce.

Get cleggy back,guaranteed double figures every meeting and pairs up superb with Ben.

Good stuff but,,, it fell down in the first sentence, ("common sense").

Anyone else bored of the silence from the club now, no number 1, everyone saying we need to start kicking up a stink regarding show ground re development but the club haven’t even said anything about what exactly they want the public/fans help with regarding this. If they want to tackle it on their own that’s fair enough but at least say something ! We’ve got to the end of this week to get a number 1 or the season is all but done, I know we will keep getting a facility for nicki blah blah but surely you want a team of 7 and not 6 plus who ever is available on the night, it’s getting pathetic now

Which is the wrong way to do it and makes it look like a load of points have gone missing. If a rider is ineligible and wins three races, your penalising the rider who finishes second each time when actually he’s WON the races and you’ve taken 3 points off him. Just ignore anything the ineligible rider scores and promote up each rider behind him, simples ! or even better….don’t use an ineligible rider ! Theres a reason the MDL is virtually dead and the NJL has been running for 13 consecutive years, get with the times, get 125 kids involved, there’s so many about now the BYC class is having to be split into separate rounds !

The forecast has been wrong most of the last 2-3 weeks. It was a guess

The thing is the changes we talk about are easy to implement, but nothing will happen until the ppl tht run the sport change sadly.

I do..but not as much as I used to when I see such lack of effort leading us..

I believe Bobby Schwartz is still racing in America

There's probably not more than 25,000 semi-regular speedway fans in Britain nowadays, and that's being generous. There's an ever diminishing number who 'used to go' - the Cardiff GP would suggest 10-15k, plus a properly promoted Wembley might get the interest of a few thousand new spectators willing to give it a go. I'd agree London is much more accessible and arguably more attractive to foreign fans, so you'd probably also pick up a fair few more there too. But I don't realistically think you'd get more than 50k, maybe 60k absolute tops. I'd agree with you about the air of hostility in Wales. I don't want to over-generalise as I go to Wales a lot and only once have directly experienced any issues, but there does seem to be an underlying air of menace in even small towns there. I don't think it's particularly directed at the English because the local youth mostly seem to want to abuse each other.

As well as the risk of a reduced crowd I expect clubs/promotions don't want to risk flying riders over for a rain off and the costs incurred by that. These early decisions are becoming more and more common and I'm pretty sure it's all about costs.

Proctor out and Joe Thompson in

Admission prices for the meeting on Saturday 13th May. CASH only if paying at the gate on the day. Adults £13.00 (18 and over) Child £1.00 (over 5) Child FREE (under 5) Family £25.00 (2 Adults + 3 Children MAX) Children MUST be accompanied by an adult

I'm gradually losing complete interest in a sport I used to love. I think the surface of our track can't absorb much water now that Chapman has put all that crap on. Proper shale drains much better, but of course that's more expensive. Enough said!

I didn't think you cared

I think there is potential for a big crowd to attend a Wembley GP, on the following basis: 1. London is easier to get to for most people than Cardiff 2. International fans can easily fly into London. Cardiff airport, surely, has limited destinations 3. London has more tourist appeal (in my opinion) than Cardiff 4. I have only attended Cardiff once, the first, and when I left the stadium, walking through Cardiff, some Welsh men seemed quite hostile. I was with my wife and felt a bit threatened, although nothing happened. Yes, that could happen in Wembley, but in my opinion, unlikely 5. Wembley stadium must carry more prestige than Cardiff's 6. I'm sure the riders would love to be able to say, they have ridden in Wembley stadium 7. With good marketing, I reckon it could at least equal 1981's gate. I won't be going to Cardiff again, but I would definitely go to Wembley!

David Howe didn’t actually

Hoping they'd get KOC or BSN fixtures fitted in to fill the gaps, but got knocked out. At least there's a NDL team at Berwick too. Although I do wonder why they had a double header when there's so many spare dates? Could understand it against Oxford or Edinburgh?

Didn't jump to anything asked a simple qs. I don't like the development league name because it really isn't, its a national league imo older and younger riders.

I have already suggested that idea

Not your daytime job is it Flappy, Weather Forcasting.

I'm not sure that "Boogaloo" is still racing. I think his only riding these day's is for demonstration only. The years are catching up with Bobby, He's a good way into his 6th decade.

Kenneth Bjerre Peter Ljung

3 will qualify indeed.

Mirko Wolter. Smoli. Stephan Katt, but not sure if he is only doing Longtrack now Quite a few of the Danes would have been riding at some level. Junior for instance. But i did see Nicolai Klindt in 2004 in what was his debut year on a 500cc. Leon Madsen in the same meeting

Janniro still “ cleaning up “in America.Won a big meeting last month and is multi times American Champ.

It is all about VFM. People don't mind paying more (as long as finances allow) as long as they think they are getting their money's worth.

And the football isn't?

Yeah...Proctor has been on the slide 4 years ....

Your right, Sir Arthur Elvin (originally from the great City of Norwich!) died in early 1957 while on a cruise at the reasonably young age of 57. He alone for some years had been the main reason League speedway continued at Wembley (speedway was apparently his first sporting love) so his death was soon followed by the Lions team being pulled out of the League by the remaining Wembley Directors. Its reasonable to suggest that had Elvin lived until his 80's then League speedway at Wembley could very well have continued uninterrupted into the 1980's, especially since speedway had a renaissance in the late 60's up until the early 80's and the 1970/71 Wembley Lions two year spell in the British League was a well supported success. - I'm sure also that a follow on from League speedway at Wembley lasting until the 80's would have been major meetings surviving for even longer (into the 1990's?) at the grand stadium when one considers that the last speedway meeting at Wembley, the 1981 World final took place 11 years after the last season of League racing there back in 1971 with quite a few other big speedway meetings taking place between 1972 and 1981. All ifs and buts like everything else in life, its always interesting to wonder how different things could have turned out just by one event not happening as it did!

The forecast has indeed changed, as often happens. When you postpone meetings more than 24 hours in advance you always run the risk of that happening. The first band of rain that was due to hit lunchtime isn’t now predicted, but rain IS still set for late evening so they may yet be proven correct, not that it really matters now. The forecast yesterday morning did look dreadful to be fair.

Clegg & Ablitt coming up with 1pt between them what a poor start from the pair of them. Absolutely certain Joe would have managed to get at least 2pts so doubling their woeful debut efforts. Robs dropped a clanger with these changes. Give it 28 days and we will be making more changes because the team average will tumble. Of course that means that June will likely be a write off away from home for us. If Dillion Rumls kit is in the UK I would see if he fancies it ? Or what about Geno Manzares hes already in Sweden is he not ? For me I would much rather watch Joe Thompson develop at Scunny than have Clegg or Ablitt who I have no allengence to at all. Might as well fill in with guests very disappointing.

'Vatcher, Vatcher, the guest snatcher'. (For those of a certain age).

Where i stand mostly XXL

The issue always appeaed to me that when tracks did "£10 Speedway" it was very much part of a marketing plan akin "Build it and they will come".. And was a one off, maybe tops two, meeting venture.. The trick that I never saw happen was to use the night as a launch pad for further targeted offers down the line... Names, mobile numbers, email and home addresses, birthday dates of the adults and more importantly maybe the kids, etc could all have been gleaned on the nights that the "special" was done.. And with that info you then target market ongoing.. Expecting someone to pay a tenner, or even nothing at all, for anything, and then expect instant constant repeat purchasers at circa twenty quid is utter folly.. Get someone attending four or five times over say a couple of months and you have more chance of hooking them long term.. A £10 Speedway night" should be planned both on and off the track and see clubs armed at the end of it with an incredible amount of information from which to build their business.. And see the fans there that night leave armed with tangibles such car stickers, pens, and other "cheap as chips" memorabilia that gets your reach out there on a base level, and also armed with contact info for those at the club, and links to club websites, fans groups etc... (But maybe not a link to us on here)..

It did the Panthers/Prem a favour at the time i think.. Nothing whatsoever for Lynn though. When it was announced i thought oh FFS, but i understood why Buster did it at the time. Still felt like a kick in the teeth for us loyal Lynn fans, who have been turning up week in week out for god knows how many years, well it did for me anyway.. What gets under my skin is the Panthers fans moaning after their 1st meeting. Their team looked better than ours !! I get they haven't started well (Take a bow NP), before they start. Guess what neither has Busters " beloved" Stars... Before i get pounced on, they have every right to complain after the start they have made.. Being there every week( AFA) in 21 when the Panthers won the league was sole destroying for me and i'm guessing many more. We won our only meeting late on it the season that year, and i remember Allit jumping up and down on the track, fists clenched, while the riders walked the through the crowd getting pats on the back and fist bumped. Almost the same pic we saw when he won the league with his other club. I wonder what Panthers fans would think if it was the other way around?? Anyway it looks like Lynn's faithful may have had enough, looking at the unusually crap attendances at this stage so far. And before i get the "well if you still go then you are the problem" brigade start. If the die hards didn't then there would be no speedway, and do true fans really want that... Time for Buster and Co to pull something out of that hat.. And fast!

Much rather dump Neilson and keep Wright but that would be a real filip to have Kemp and the twins

I take it you mean "Where are the Brum Fans"?