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Thumbs up to the Comets management 😄 just been in town and the local electronic advertising board at bottom of Ramsey brow, main entrance into the town, has a message for all to see. Thank you to all supporters and sponsors for supporting us 2025 season

Can you join border force - that's a better effort than the current lot

Have to totally disagree there, King is definitely Number 1 material. 2nd highest away average in the whole league behind Sam Masters (9.30) Plus won 49 heats in total, Only Masters, Lawson and Harris were ahead of him.

This is were Speedway will (and always has done) fall down. How to maintain that engagement at live meetings? You're trying to attract the next generation which have the attention spans of a fish. For a newbie, going to a live meeting today, 2½ hours for about 40mins of entertainment, if you're in to practice starts & laps of honour. Otherwise, it's 15mins of entertainment. For that privilege, it cost £25. Also, the quality of the Stadia in the UK, for any middle/upper class citizen its horrific. The truth is, British Speedway is lower class trying to sell itself to the affluent. This is were it's not working. 100%, the attendances would be far higher if it was £10/15 with an Offy, a Vape Shop & a Turkish barbers selling class A's. The sport would be as big as football then 🤣

Beau Bailey will need to finish in the top 4 in a Aussie state championship to be able to qualify for a uk visa.

All those things are great and may have got a lot of people through the door but when they attend and stand out in the cold/wind being 'entertained' by someone on a mic talking drivel or just music for what seems like an eternity balanced against the 15 minutes of actual races, of which two were interesting then most won't come back. It's the entertainment at the track on the night which has to improve - and I don't mean just more races. More interaction, more involvement of fans in the night, interactive social media, rider interaction, play areas/side shows and many other ideas that people have mentioned before.

Danny had a hand injury so it had to be managed, so he took fewer ht 15s. Danny is a quality rider, but he is also good with younger team mates giving advice and helping. He's a great team man.

Tunners would put on a point at the bare minimum riding the NSS every other week. He’d be a far better signing for Belle Vue than anyone else IMO. Having watched a fair bit of PHB the last couple of years as well, he’d be a huge home favourite very quickly. Track is tailor made for him. Keeping the best top two in the league as well and you’d outgun everyone else in 13 and 15. If that is the team, I think we’d see @AceBellerise from the dead very quickly on here… 😉

This is what we’ve done to attract fans to Belle Vue over the last decade or so….. Have an advert on local radio over an extended period of time. Have an advert in local newspapers over an extended period of time. Have an advertising board on some of the busiest roads in Manchester. Have posters in shops and businesses. Had out flyers in local shopping areas. Have a float or attend local fairs and carnivals. Attend local trade shows. Give out free tickets to schools and businesses. Take bikes and merchandise into schools to accompany the talk they deliver on the sport. Be featured on local tv news’s 4 or 5 times between March and October. Have a regular editorial in local papers. Have a 30 minute highlights programme on a local tv satellite station. Form a tie up with local groups and offer free entry and supporters club membership. Attend (and win) local sports team of the year awards. I’ve probably missed a few others.

Agreed but I think they’ll bring him back, they are loyal to a fault with a lot of riders and Hume also seems very popular with the casual Bandits fan, you can see that just by looking at the comments on Facebook for the last couple of seasons. I think for similar reasons we’ll see Jack Smith back despite the fact he has probably peaked in his ability he seems very popular with the promotion and fans alike. Personally I would have neither if your goal is to try and win a trophy or at least make the play offs for the first time in over a decade but that doesn’t often seem the goal.

Think it is financial suicide for any team to make the numbers up in the Premier League.

If that’s what’s being considered it just shows how much trouble the so called Premiership is in.Desperate times for the sport.If that’s their answer to keeping a failing League. Cant possibly see how that will be viable.

Luke Harrison’s Facebook page has been implying he won’t be back at scunny next year. Would be a tremendous shame as he’s developing nicely however I understand his dad will want him to try different tracks

This is exactly what I am getting at. You need to make it easy to stumble across as well as keeping it short enough to keep viewers engaged (not too much nothingness between heats).

Many amateur and semi pro sports teams on YouTube do it themselves... A 4k Go pro camera being the usual camera of choice... Some have over 250,000 followers and subscribers... 20 mins the maximum needed to maintain the interest of the "younger generation".. Making the riders the stars being just as important, (maybe even more so), than even the action on show... Pre meeting arrival of the riders, track walk snippets, a bit of action interspersed with pits conversations, post match celebrations and sound bites from the managers and riders.. Speedway clubs should have done this, at least, five years ago... However, middle aged (and older), white males generally wouldn't see the huge opportunities that such "programmes" can open up given the algorithm used will take you from one to another... Another opportunity missed by only using those within the "speedway bubble echo chamber"....

And, I must admit.... I was completely unaware of pretty much all of them... The half hour on satellite TV was, I think, on M and Motors which was a US cable type local station, which I saw once... I do live in Stockport though, not Manchester, but do drive through the city often and haven't been aware of any billboards other than SON and GP ones which appeared when their events were held in Manchester... Good to see such initiatives are alive though, but there looks like there still isn't the output for the input... And, once again, it is done at local and not national level, which is where the sport needs to be marketing itself using a professional marketing company...

I dread to think what attendances would have been like at Belle Vue if none of the efforts listed above had taken place?

Speaking as a former sponsor rider's start off grateful end up demanding , maybe just my bad luck but it happened almost everytime

Bluey Scott, Charlie Monk, Nils Paulsen, Trevor Redmond, Bruce Ovenden, Willie Templeton & Graham Coombes. Maury Mattingley on bike, Two Aussies, Two Kiwis (3 if you count Trevor), One Norwegian, One Englishman and a Scot. Not many 2.5% reductions there......

Something that never gets mentioned about Poland and their huge pay structure is riders can also get huge fines/deductions from the clubs for sometimes the most innocuous reasons like mechanic wearing wrong team shirt at a match or not displaying PGE extraleague sticker on back door of van or whatever but one thing it does do is get 100% dedication from the riders, it gets discipline and as a result you get a product that has credibility

The thing is... If someone is "OK" at spending a quarter of a million to keep a Speedway team going... They would do the sport far more good by just putting that amount up as prize money... Many come on here saying "sponsors pay for the No1's" when someone mentions the cost of them and that the gate revenue wouldn't support their inclusion... Again, these "wealthy sponsors", putting in high five figure numbers, at individual tracks, would raise the sports profile NATIONALLY far more by using this money to make a "huge" prize pot, than any individual rider would raise it by riding for any team... Literally MILLIONS has been pumped into the sport by TV, Sponsors, admission money and the deep pockets of the owners.... And the return on such a huge investment is what we have today... A strange "insular" use of an enormous resource pool that could have got some traction if used more broadly for increasing the sports awareness amongst the wider UK public...

Northampton Saints with Travis Perkins as Team sponsor to tie in with Rugby union team was the latest that I had heard.I believe there is some people who are involved in both sports that are part of this new venture. Them work progressing through the summer to move to Northampton later in year or 2027

Wouldn’t have thought a single Lynn supporter would be at all bothered with that. Maybe I’m wrong but I’d say the majority if not all, would be over the moon to sign up a genuine class number 1 and the leagues best rider this season just gone. Wasn’t just the heavy points he scored either, it was the way he scored them. Seemed very entertaining which I’m sure the Leicester fans will verify. Fricke would give the club and supporters a massive lift.

Heard from a good source it's Eddie Kennett.

The sinking ship called the Premier League is heading for the rocks. Loss of UK venues has been a major factor in recent years. Their defunct club supporters have all probably been lost to the sport never to return. Established stadia with a speedway oval and capable of housing a few thousand patrons in reasonable comfort aren't out there. An ever ageing but dwindling nucleus of speedway supporters with fond memories of past glory still cling on to the wreckage in traditional speedway hotspots. Attempts to promote clubs from the Championship League have been tried and I cannot name one that has been successful ? Costs of operating on the Premier League (although a closely guarded secret) and the restrictive race nights of operation are certainly a major issue. The money for riders is in Poland nowadays, why any of them ride in the UK can only be for personal reasons, it cannot be for the money on offer. WHEN will the league decay into one league and a training Conference league ? The PL cannot hold out for much longer.

You've proved my point. Speedway (and the others you mentioned) were not viable, hence they chose to redevelop the site. Wimbledon previously closed in 1991 for exactly the same reason. And both 1991 and 2005 were periods when Speedway was in better shape than it is now! There is absolutely NO chance of Wimbledon, Coventry, Swindon, or any other closed tracks being revived and the sooner these campaigners open their eyes and get on with their lives, tbe better. Everyone is getting excited about Buxton - that won't last the season for exactly the same reason. Speedway. Is. Not. Viable.

A few people on here putting together teams from their averages, for next season, but would be interesting to see what they thought each rider would cost + travel for that team. forget all other costs of running team, just purely riders wages. would it add up ???

He thinks we are all as stupid as he is.

Its just the old heat 13 and 15 issue as no big hitter but if its a watered down league and the rest only have one big hitter they might get away with it.

The promise that if they attended that they didn't have to sit next to Ouch all night

Unfortunately without the tv money we can’t even carry on as we were

Thats all very well but does bailey have the criteria to qualify for a visa?

Maybe he was one of the Leicester riders on their phones during the final.

And just to finish a brilliant 2025

That is for the people with the knowledge to decide, but we can't just keep blocking changes to the sport just because they cost money. People aren't just going to become fans of the sport for no reason. You need to make it easy to follow, easy to engage with, make it easier to see results and rider data so they can learn more and gain an interest in the sport. I would suggest making it free on YouTube and subsidising the cost via sponsoring of the videos. The main issue would be getting the footage itself, to edit and voice over a 25 minute YouTube video shouldn't be too difficult. Also having it on YouTube should make it accessible to a wide range of audiences and hopefully should recommend the content to fans of similar motorsports and grow an audience that way. In my opinion we are at the stage where things just need to be tried as otherwise the sport is going to slowly die.

Agreed certainly for home meetings Tungate would be a great signing for the aces.

Second left Charlie Monk Second Right Doug Templeton

Landlords will want the same money for the year, so less meetings means the rent for each one will be higher. Fanbase will be smaller because people will get out of the habit of going if they're less frequent. Can't make one as you're on holiday and the next one is not for a month it's easy to think oh well I won't bother as you've probably found an alternative routine/thing to do.

But if Kurtz & Bewley were taking points off each other (lowering their average), would not Holder & Musielak have been doing the same when Tobiasz averaged 8.69? In fact if Musielak was behind Holder in most heat 13s / 15s, does that not make his 8.69 average even more impressive? Which would mean Lynn signed a "real number 1" in 2024. Yes he was poor & disappeared, but that doesn't mean Lynn didn't sign a number 1.

Dont know where this Boughen talk comes from, there is more chance of me riding for Poole!!

I can't see the logic in running a prem team at an existing club under a different name, it just strikes me as more desperation to get the numbers up in the top league, I just hope whoever is taking this on has uber deep pockets as sadly I fear they are going to need bucket loads of cash to burn, would love to be proved wrong and its a success.

i forgot about this, happy with 6th at least i didnt finish bottom

But the difference is Ipswich Town will benefit from at least £38M just from Tv money alone per season and this doesn't include merit payments every time they are shown live. Comparing speedway with football just isn't cricket 🤪

Had the good fortune to meet an avid Plymouth fan over the weekend he informed that immediiately Scott N arrived the whole team and club seemed to get an incredible lift .In no time at all his merchandise was flying off the shelves and he was being lauded by almost every supporter .His approach to riding ,team mates and the fans meant in his opinion his return for 2026 was crucial even if he may no longer an out and out number 1 at Champ level . It was great to witness this enthusiasm which we don't see a great deal of within our sport these days !

Bring in weight limits bike and rider, you will get more riders interested instead of a team of midgets

The sport is in a real mess at the moment

we will deffo go with dan and brady if rules allow it, only way of stopping them 2 is one rider over 8 rule, meaning tate will be back in the team on a 3 average and while that will upset a few aces fans i for one will give tate a 2nd chance

Problem is it's a team sport using sub contractors metaphorically speaking . I've been in rider negotiations where they were demanding a certain place in the pits ! It was rediculous what goes on with these so called "star riders"but it's hard to resist if you have someone who can knock in double figures week in week out . I've seen so many that would ride at a training school with ice on the puddles end up refusing to ride after a light shower of rain a few years later . I don't see anyway of reining the riders in unless there is a true concensus of agreement between the promoters and the govt body , I won't be holding my breath on that one !