Leaderboard

i still think the downfall of British speedway started when Rye House were allowed to track foreign riders. if we still had a division of British & Commonwealth riders we'd be in a much healthier position. if, and from what i'm hearing is true, it goes to one league next year, then riders will say thay can't make ends meet if they can't double up. in my day we had jobs and took one bike to a meeting. so many riders never use their spare bike anyway, they jump on a team mates bike when they have a spare in the pits! tracks should be allowed to ride on a night that suits THEM, not be forced into changes. and years ago when the sport was successful here, how many teams raced on a Saturday. not having time for supporters to go to away meetings due to work etc has had a serious knock on

And therein we have the the major factor when you talk to non speedway devotees. I try, or certainly used to, to persuade folk who stand with me at Derwent Park rugby matches to have a dabble at watching speedway. Hard bloody work I'll tell ya. They respond with, for example, the main one currently in fact "so how many teams does Chris Harris ride for"?.....It's often followed with - "doesn't the first rider to lead at the first bend always win the race"?. ..My answers are -Well Chris is a popular guest rider..doh. And second point - yes if the rider is good enough to stay in front he'll win..doh. So sadly two major drawbacks to stop a fan liking speedway. The rugby lot won't shift opinion on those views. But us regular fans know of plenty more for sure. How often down the years have we stood around for 40/50 minutes between heats without a tannoy update to keep us happy? Usually awaiting first aid cover ? There are lots to deliberate as speedway's downside. BUT seriously it's a smashing sport which I've enjoyed since 1970. When 6000 plus welcomed the Comets versus Berwick. And Friday nights were just brilliant. I don't know how to recover those who have lost faith, wish I could find a cure. Hopefully the current Workington problem is sorted asap and I can watch another 50 years. UTC, marras.

Some very valid points there. The Rye House thing was a few years before I got into speedway but when I look back at my Programme collection its noticeable that all the riders in the National League we British or Commonwealth and there were plenty of rides to go around. I think the doubling up policy was the most stupid thing the powers that be ever did. I appreciate that from a riders view it means more earnings but it has killed club speedway. Once upon a time a rider would be identified with one club only. Now all you see is the same riders against each other in a different race jacket depending on what night of the week it is.

Blobby, you’re an Edinburgh fan and I’m a Glasgow fan, so enjoy the nick of us here. We should be pointed at and laughed at. Please, however, don’t tolerate, never mind excuse this track. Trust me; it will play its part in the death of the sport in this country. This is the third meeting BSN have covered at Wimborne Road this season and it’s been the same dull, boring, stale, lifeless, monotonous show every single time. This isn’t unique to this evening.

And some people wonder why speedway is dying a death in the UK...

I will take that as an honour considering the amount of 5hit written on this forum.

Look at the state of this. It looks like someone’s let off a flare, it’s so dusty.

Following his captains lead - seems its the Belle Vue way

Hahahaha, where did you get that utter nonsense from? You're just making up stuff to suit your own agenda. Boothby has a 10-year lease, running to 2032, and there are already talks about extending that. Speedway is a big part of Boothby's plans, mainly because the speedway is still making a healthy profit. The ONLY doubt is whether Oxford run in all three leagues again. Attendances are still extremely good at Championship (1,200 ish) and National League (800+) level, and have only waned slightly at Premiership level (but still at around 1,200) - mainly due to results I would imagine. There is zero doubt about whether Oxford will be running next year - what a totally uninformed thing to say, simply said to scare people without any evidence whatsoever.

I'm not sure they're trying to win something with very little kudos, I think it's more like they're trying to win races to get noticed by Polish clubs. If it were down to me, it'd be ultimatum time, riders commit to this country in something like a 40 match calendar or clear off and earn their bacon elsewhere. Our clubs need to be riding on the nights that suit them... not the riders.

The only time they finished 1st and 2nd all night!

Very little housing in the immediate area and mostly industrial. As stated, a massive Viridor site on the doorstep so the Council won't care what goes there as long as there palm is greased. Certainly unlike other locations if the Go-Kart company owns the freehold there is next to zero chance anybody would want to put housing there with a waste refuse site next door. Would only be a company looking to put more industrial or logistics sites. It could be a simple set up like Workington and have a chance - tram line 5 min walk away. So has transport access

Nothing to prep, wont hold water in because theirs no material to hold it in, blue groove says it all really. Pirates rider win bonus at Glasgow would have been better spent on some shale, give the track guys something to do instead of watering concrete.

Not sure who the full time track staff are Id love to meet them! Not sure why your laughing at Tyretrax reply saying track staff have full time jobs! Oh ye Im 1 of the guys who works full time during the day then volunteers to work couple evenings a week!! There's 4 of us who spend a lot of our own time working there to give good racing! Only truth there is yes we can access 24/7!

The size of that blue grove. Ridiculous no excuse.

Anybody know if the hotdogs are real sausages or those wannabe sausages?

Go get turnbull out the box and get yourselves down to specsavers. Not only a blue groove in 1&2 but one on 3&4 too the cameras don’t lie. More entertaining watching paint dry than this tripe, what a horrific track.

Why do they keep going back to Poole awful awful place to watch speedway Glasgow haven’t turned up and I’m just hoping Dan T can get away unscathed Poole will win the league easily with a home track like this

Wrong on all counts. Dust blue groove and a gaters paradise with minimal entertainment

Doubling up has caused a huge amount of damage... It started off controlled with two UK riders max per team.. Then, before we knew it, almost every member of each team had a minimum of two clubs.. Sam Masters a few years ago actually spent a couple of months being No1 in the averages of both leagues!!! Imagine trying to markef fhat? When riders rode for one team, and got injured, by the time their next meeting came around they often had enough time to get well, or, if not a guest was used if the rider was of a certain level.. Now, many riders of any level getting injured on a Monday could miss Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday matches in Div 2... Meaning guest after guest, after guest to replace them.. Complete nonsense...

Hopefully people don’t expect too much from Will Cairns it’s a massive step from NDL racing coming into the Premiership even if it’s only the one guest appearance. He made competitive debut for Zielona Gora on Tuesday in U24 league and scored 0 from his 5 rides, so that should put things into a little perspective

Agree.Let the riders who can’t make the sport pay in Uk earn their fortune elsewhere.

I'd be interested to know what makes up a "huge target audience"? Birmingham is now a "minority majority" city. White people, who are the traditional audience for motorsports are now only 49% of the population. The other 51% have never considered speedway as "in their culture". So you can divide "huge" by half. Demographically, Birmingham is one of the youngest cities around. Speedway's typical fans are now pensioners or approaching pension age. And there aren't that many of them in Birmingham's population any more. Speedway has consistently pandered to the existing (& dying out) older fan base and never really adapted to the younger reality. And that will be its epitaph. Whilst channel hopping on TV, I stumbled on a sport that seems to be reinventing itself. From totally amatur(ish) beginnings, it now has a premier league, a national team, international fixtures, and apparently it attracts (subject to venue size) and average of 1,500 fans per match, which it bemoans as "under-performing" but which speedway teams would die for. Have you guessed what it is yet? Yeah, women's netball! https://www.skysports.com/netball/news/30100/12058326/tamsin-greenway-netball-must-understand-its-audience-and-deliver-targeted-engagement So please don't make any more excuses about how a sport can't turn itself around, It can. Cricket has, Darts has, Snooker has, now Netball has. Speedway CAN, it just WON'T.

A respectable track would be better for the sport.

That’s no excuse having a track prepared like that abomination tonight.

That Poole track is crap. Glasgow were crap. Sums a crap night up.

From reading the comments... I take it the tide was out...?

ben cook has said in a recent interview that there was nothing wrong with the track the night he broke his wrist so stop making stuff up meanwhile dickson freely admitted to preparing his track differently at the expense of entertainment for the lynn a fixture not to mention the sh it show when the young stars rode at leicester pretty unforgivable imo give me a bit of grip over a dustbowl any day

Cairns has no issue with riding in the dirt, simple sacrifice entertainment for trophies, each to their own i suppose.

Richard Lawson 15 point maximum and 4% of RotN vote!

See what happens when someone from the opposition decides to turn up. 😆

Not sure but they will be served with a generous dusting I reckon.

Track isn’t as bad as folk are making out, it’s not fantastic yes, but also takes two to tango and so far only one team has turned up.

This is just awful what an absolute crap track Kerr left the start about half hour before anyone else and the ref missed it Don’t want Poole in the top league with a track like this

WRONG! and WRONG! Who would have thought the parade lap and heat six!! 😂😂

This is absolute brain damage speedway. Let’s hope there’s no first time viewers because as a spectacle, this has been utter rubbishe. Six races and the only pass beyond the back straight of lap one was Lawson’s questionable one on Hodder. Such a poor meeting in terms of entertainment. I remember Poole used to host the SWC; it was outstanding. What happened?

Oh come on, track is dire, spoonful of dirt of which gets scraped down to the inside line on every grade. Armadale might be small but you can see your track guys put the effort in to getting a 'racing' surface, Poole is purely prepped for a home win IMHO.

What are you talking about?

Yeah Tellboy, pointed King out. I looked at last months figures

Good old days of Saturday night speedway

If we have that team, leicester will produce a rough track with their win at all costs attitude they admitted last time we were in town. S0d the entertainment... ....and we wonder why crowds are poor

A guarantee may put Australians at an advantage, but generally they do turn up, tend to be quick learners and good racers. The problem with a lot of young Brits is they think they're the biggest thing since powdered milk once they have the sign written van and a bit of eye candy on their arm.

They started watering the track yesterday.

Thank you for letting me know. I missed the posting. A good age though! RIP John

Wasn't Woffy forced to ride injured by Wroclaw? I'm sure he said as much on socials... and I'm sure I don't need to remind you that the most recent cases of riders losing their lives and suffering life changing injuries on track have all happened in Poland.

01.07.2025: Ekstraliga U24: Grudziądz v Lublin: https://youtu.be/Mhgt5Pkzkaw?si=dosAEkYhZfTh6HFh 29.06.2025: R10, Toruń v Zielona Góra: https://vk.com/video-53550004_456242275 29.06.2025: R10, Rybnik v Częstochowa: https://vk.com/video-53550004_456242276 27.06.2025: R10, Lublin v Grudziądz: https://vk.com/video-53550004_456242267 27.06.2025: R10, Gorzów v Zielona Góra: https://vk.com/video-53550004_456242268 26.06.2025; R9, Bydgoszcz v Ostrów: https://vk.com/video-220089063_456247013 29.06.2025: R10, Leszno v Rzeszów: https://vk.com/video-220089063_456247077 29.06.2025: R10, Krosno v Łódź: https://vk.com/video-220089063_456247078

The price point is a major issue for the sport, and dissuades visits... Utopia is GP stars at £15 a pop, but that won't happen... However, it should given the TV money should have been used to subsidise the entrance fee... Ironically the top lads will bring a few extra in and maybe could be "cost neutral", or thereabouts, but it is the fully pro rest of the team that are not "cost neutral" as they bring hardly anyone extra in... You even have NDL lads with personalised sign written vans!!!??? If BZ turned up this weekend with £5k of gold handlebars, you can bet several riders would also want them, as with them, they could ride like him couldn't they? 🤪... Maybe Speedway should do something similar to what Rugby League and Non League Football do when the International matches are on, and do a "magic week" or maybe a fortnight so every track has a home meeting.. Well publicised, well planned, and every adult in for a tenner, with all 18 and under kids still in education in for free.. Get as many emails and mobile numbers as is possible to keep communicating with those who turn up and keep sending them offers out if they haven't attended again over the next week or two.. A bit of a reset, with the aim to impress the punters off and on the track..

The reason Belle Vue are successful at home is because of home advantage, every team has home Advantage it is not something that needs defending.

You are Clarke Osborne. Where do i claim my £5 please......

I’ve sat back and let people crack on but after reading through page after page, I’m gonna say my bit. The amount of people first off running there mouths saying some disgraceful things about Andrew etc is ridiculous. There’s absolutely no need for it. People thinking they’ve got it cracked what’s going on, throwing about silly rumours just to get everybody riled up doesn’t help the situation. I suggest you’s all take a back seat, and await further information. 99% of you clearly haven’t got a clue what’s going on and think you’s do. Wind your necks in, stop abusing the promotion that’s put their hearts and souls into bringing speedway back to the town and stop acting like an entitled bunch. The only people who should know what’s going on at this stage is the promotion, then comes sponsors and when’s the times right, the public will be updated.