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What I do not really understand from a financial aspect is that very few if any riders are a major draw for fans who know the sport let alone potential new supporters so why pander to the riders demands paying over the odds for nil return? Build teams that are viable and some riders will climb the professional ladder and perhaps make it to GP level but if the tracks that do exist put out teams who can provide exciting racing each week at whatever level and it is affordable and competitive then that is where UK speedway is. Let’s face this country cannot get decent crowds to turn out for a GP and the halcyon days of big names attracting 50k to 60k are never going to happen. If riders cannot make a living riding for one club then the cost of participating is too expensive and needs looking at. Expecting increasing numbers of supporters and sponsors to pay someone the equivalent of an annual salary for six months work is nonsense. The whole business model is barmy and has been for years. Fools and their money are soon parted and that applies across the entire speedway spectrum.

So you're happy to believe that Stewart Dickson is a liar while at the same time believe in your own mind that Mayfield Sport are going to be huge for British Speedway, with absolutely zero experience and no track record... how very strange

I think the reality is most have other businesses that make money that they can offset the speedway losses against the other business profits , its still not ideal as it doesn't eliminate the loss merely reduces it from a tax perspective. I think 99% of us on here would agree from the current bunch of promoters other than Louis and the Fords probably nobody else makes money out of the sport. The promoters take plenty of stick and a lot of time rightly so but equally they are subsidising the sport we all desperately want to succeed like it did in the 70's and early 80's sadly I'm coming round to the idea there is no saving it the sport is just a bygone of another age like nightclubs where the young of today just have no interest in either of them.

My lad gets paid for playing football on Saturdays and on Sundays... Semi pro level on the Saturday and normal Sunday League stuff the next day... The bloke who owns the Semi Pro team runs a Sunday team and pays a few of the lads to play.. There are a couple of other teams on the Sunday who also pay players, with the three teams easily better than the rest... UK Speedway, for me, has a similar vibe to it... Many benefactors who are quite happy running it as a hobby they can afford, and, with no real kudos, publicity, or financial rewards for winning, meaning, its more of an enjoyable labour of love, rather than a bona fide sporting occasion that they present... And, given the lack of authenticity as a team sport that Speedway in the UK has, you can see why many are quite happy to never change things...

It’s no cop out at all. Had we not of brought Simon in to this team it was highly likely there would not have been a young stars team in 2026. Simon will be a fantastic rider coach. Even Jake Mulford will learn more from Simon. I like to have a rider coach in my teams whenever it’s been possible. In 2007 at Redcar I had Mark ‘buzz’ Burrows and in 2015 at Buxton I had Tony Atkin. 2 great captains and rider coaches. Every team should have one at this level, for the younger ones to learn from.

that comment was for a few people on here who because we say what we are seeing, they are classing that as hating British speedway , they have lost the plot.

It’s not really hate I don’t think . I think everybody’s opinions come from astonishment, frustration and anger but probably most of all , sadness, at the state our once great and attractive sport has been allowed to decay to this point. Any hate is towards the clowns responsible I reckon. I like your enthusiasm though . Bring on the March ? April? May ? start of the season.

It's barmy isn't it? They will get around 1000 fans (tops), and spend around £400k to £500k to do it... Money that, if they have got it to burn, would be better invested in getting 1000 extra fans at the 14 existing tracks... This growing the sport hugely in percentage terms.. Maybe use some of this cash to fund free away fan admission to add a bit of tribal atmosphere, and make you feel you are actually at a team sport with relevance?

Spot on its getting harder and harder for the sport to survive when I used to go mid 80's to early 90's if a track was in trouble there were normally 4-5 interested parties in taking over. They would then survive 2-5 years on average loose a bundle then rinse and repeat, but these days there's maybe one-two interested parties or none. It also frustrates me that when the Sky money came in the top riders seem to have hoovered up 90% of it then left for Poland as soon as the trough was empty, now I get they could suffer horrible injuries tin any race and need to maximise earnings but part of me also thinks you were fed well when the big money was sloshing around maybe a bit of loyalty to the UK was warranted. As you say the only way I see out is someone with tens of millions coming in buying up 15-20 tracks/stadiums then franchising out to promoters with the big dog making the rules , two leagues of eight with promotion and relegation. I don't think there's any speedway haters on here just fans who love the sport and are heart broken how its now on life support I bang on about it but the last four heats of the last world team cup show how good it can be when every team was in contention down to the last four heats and Magic took Rob Lambert from the back on the last lap to win it for Poland. We were also spoilt back in the day for riders who were magicians on bikes like Kelly Moran, Henka, Jan O Pederson, Loram, John Cook , T Rick etc there just don't seem as many of that type of rider around today or maybe its just down to rocket ship bikes.

Simon Lambert hasn’t stopped these riders from riding. I contacted Mark Parker back on January 18th and he told me he doesn’t want to ride in 2026. I already have my 2 reserves in Kenzie COSSEY and Ollie BINNS, who are both making their first full season debuts in the NDL and BOTH are British riders and always lived in the UK. You’ll have to ask the northern based clubs why they haven’t given team places to Liam Greens, Laylen Richardson, Owen Booth and Billy Budd. Maybe Greens didn’t want a team spot? I know he’s always busy helping the Pijper brothers these days. With respect to Booth and Richardson, they are not yet ready for NDL racing. That’s not saying they never will be, but they need to be winning races regularly in the NJL and Amateur meetings first, before clubs will look at giving them a start in a declared 1-7. Both great lads to deal with, but clubs look at things like this before they offer a regular team spot to riders coming through. Both are still young and have time yet to be knocking on the door for a regular team spot. Billy Budd impressed me last season when I seen him race a couple of times for the Colts at the back end of the season. Unfortunately I wasn’t in a position to offer him a team spot in the end.

A team sport with relevance would involve promotion and relegation in my humble opinion. Meeting’s with jeopardy in them. And teams not dictating to the sport what league they will and won’t ride in. It’s all so amateurish really. Professional in name only. For now.

Lots different things going on. My understanding was the team is signed an announcement is due tomorrow & the owners are who we all think they are. lets see what the week brings.

And you know that how? Because Dickson said so in the Star? Funny how you and Iain are more than happy to Believe every word your Team manager says, but when riders openly state they can’t afford to ride in one league and would retire if one league came to pass, you’re all quick to disbelieve them and rip the pi$$ out of them!

The scary thing is I stood with Dave Hemsley a couple of seasons ago watching the lions and he told me the rent for Cairns and it's cheaper than I thought it would be. Plus Cairns have paid 3 years worth of rent straight away. So you would have thought Leicester have a great opportunity to actually make some money, considering the track is also available 7 days a week and we get decent crowds. It's crazy how expensive running a team in the premiership is. If Leicester can't even break even, who is actually turning a profit? Nobody Im guessing.

Can you tell me, which ‘young’ rider is losing out on a team place because of Simon ? All the other heat leaders have either decided not to compete in the NDL in 2026 or they’ve already got team spots. There was no way I was going to run with just one heat leader, 3 second strings and 3 reserves, especially when all the other clubs have 3 heat leaders and a couple of teams 4 heat leaders. We wouldn’t have been able to compete had we not have brought Simon and Jake in. I’m sure no one wanted to see the league reduced even further and also this way we can still give rides to 5 other riders over the season and 2 of those are starting their first full seasons at NDL level. So let’s look at the positives.

I can 100% assure you that Lynn did not push for a 42 limit. Don’t know where you got that from. Lynn were 1 of 2 clubs who voted against the higher limit. The higher 42 limit nearly had the league down to only 5 clubs. We lost a full team and didn’t have a clue where we were going to get any Heat leaders from, as they’ve either decided not to race NDL in 2026 or they have managed to fit into the other 5 teams because of the higher limit. Believe me, we came very close to not having a team in the NDL in 2026. Simon Lambert and Jake Mulford coming in has made sure we can come back to the tapes for another season at this level.

It's a rich mans play thing, not a business.

If this is an indication of the way they work then I’m all for it. The way it should be really. I’m interested to see what they do with it all, how it’s promoted, how it’s presented etc. Will they add anything different to the meeting day experience? Do something different? Who knows. Also, will they add any extra meetings? Individuals, international meetings. That’s one thing Louis has done less and less of the last few years and with a sparse fixture list, adding a few extra would be most welcome.

Yes to all of the above, many Sports have lost characters and have adapted accordingly, Speedway obviously suffers because it’s expensive to get in to, it’s reliant on the weather and the model of the Sport imo no longer works, especially for a modern audience, new sports have sprung up since the time we were kids, see examples in the Winter Olympics for an obvious example and the emergence of Women’s sports. Many of these newer sports are niche/minority but they are slick and professionally presented, yet look at the enthusiastic crowds. We have had GP’s in ready made stadia, that were established and served up dross, the Cardiff GP (I forget the year, but myself and a mate went) it was appalling, and still people defended it. We can’t keep looking back, if you can’t market a team sport, that is fast, dangerous and colourful and in which a race lasts 60 secs, which is about the average concentration level of a modern day person (tongue firmly in cheek) and you have multiple Social Media platforms to do this (Insta, X, BlueSky, YT, Reddit, Mastadon, FB etc) oh and David Howe’s daughter then what hope has the sport got?!

Hawkins IS a good team manager.

Sam Ermolenko makes Richie Hawkins look like a good TM ..

come on lads stop being British speedway haters from this year the only way is up .

Would suggest that Lambert would be better option than Starke.IMO

Simon Lambert 🤣

I really don't understand your reply? What has Stewart Dickson got to do with what I commented? I'm talking about the rent the stadium owner charges per month.

Well I know how because the landlord told me. He ran the club and he's dealt with bates and now cairns. I'm telling a fact it's as simple as that. If you can't deal with it move on

Agree totally that there is no interest from the club authorities . But to the riders selected it's huge riding against the best there is only makes you better.

Can't agree with you for once. All FIM meetings are very important, but FIM Europe events are run by and for Polish television, and should be if no interest to UK authorities

But it isn't. It's a moderately well-off man's plaything. If a Speedway team loses £100k in a season, that's chickenfeed to a "rich man" Look at football. Look how much, on average, a Premiership football team loses. Look at Championship football, look at League 1, Look at League 2. League 2 is most economical, but even there, each club will lose, on average, around £3 million a year. A £100k loss on a Speedway club is a bargain.

The trouble is they're rich enough to buy and run a club but not rich enough to really do anything meaningful to improve things. I was listening to the guy from Mildenhall on the 360 podcast this week and he deserves all the credit for doing what he's done there and the same goes for the guy at Worky but when you listen to them speak it's painfully obvious that they have no real ideas on what to do to improve the sport, especially at a national level. Listening to Rob Godfrey also the other week and he said they've got David Howe's daughter helping them out with the socials. Now I know nothing about David Howe's daughter maybe she runs a successful creative agency, brilliant if she does and good luck to her, but if she doesn't then is that really going to achieve the results that the sport desperately needs?

So, Leicester who have openly admitted to (heavy?) losses over the last couple of years, have binned off their draw card and are in for another season with a (heavy?) loss... yet are still propping up a new team, that is bound to make, erm a heavy loss! You just couldn't make this stuff up! What on earth are those trying to make this happen thinking of? 🤷‍♂️ And that's just a Leicester perspective, Sheffield seem to be in a similar boat though they've kept their big hitters. Can't think that it would be any different for the Aces and Stars.

There are now more threads about the fixtures than there are confirmed fixtures

Andrew Bain told me today it’s Campbell who does it

Well a friend of a friend spoke with someone close (very) to the situation and they said that it should be but couldnt/wouldn't confirm anything else - including the team (not that they had any input in that anyway) so perhaps,maybe, if we are lucky etc etc

That was the year Bewley won when it was more like a super cross track, I went to Odsal in 85 and 1990 brilliant atmospheres both times with the tribal nature needed and some superb racing but the days of getting 45-50k in for World finals in the UK also seem gone forever.

Absolutely correct, can think of a number of 'senior' riders who were great with the youngsters in recent years, Jon Armstrong especially comes to mind with the 2 you mentioned.

Parker greens booth budd Richardson

Fabulous couple of days at the show,made a couple of pennies and hopefully along Jan staechmann, Aiden and Les Collins Buxton, belle vue and Workington and their stands all got speedway out there. Where were the bspl ? Where were speedway futures ? Where were all the other teams, it’s FREE for clubs to have a stand to 1000s of folks, I despair at this sport at times

JA? You must be Joshing, It's Jon Armstrong. Heard he's having a race-off against Tony Atkin and Gary O'Hare to see who gets the last Buxton spot.

Yet literally seven figures spent on the riders who if any of them rode down the street outside their track, no one would have a clue who they are or what they do... A baffling complete waste of what is a huge resource, given "nothing changes" from one season to the next in regards to crowd growth....

Business men now, seperate ventures and making good money apparently. They both achieved enough in speedway and wouldn't of benefited from carrying on , so have made mature decisions imo.

There’s FIVE guaranteed Premiership teams, but you already knew that didn’t you Mike? https://britishspeedway.co.uk/rowe-motor-oil-premiership/2026-premiership-update/ Just to to jog your memory incase you’ve developed a severe case of amnesia.

Nice to hear some info from someone who's actually involved and knows what's happening and not just someone not in the know who makes cra p up to make themselves feel important... Thank you

No they wouldn't, all fans truly care about at the end of the day is winning... The vast majority anyway. You're not going to get numbers through the door because there's a team of developing riders if they're getting battered every week, it just doesn't happen.

Surely Iain any right minded business looking to back and sponsor speedway must be off their rocker?

Nicolai is putting on a really exciting testimonial. NK Testimonial on Facebook provides all sorts of information. He's also putting on a special event the night (also in King's Lynn, but at The Rathskeller) before where he'll be chatting to fans, alongside Niels-Kristian Iversen and Mads Korneliussen, about their careers. Full details for that at sportingknights.co.uk/events

brennan is your no1. so build your teams with that in mind

That makes sense & I suspect that we’ll have Brennan,King & Jenkins back alongside Edwards from last year. However I did hear a whisper that only 3 from last year were back. So could 1 of Brennan , Jenkins or King be off to Northampton ?? Or really left field King is back but as Team Manager. Interesting times

I will have mine battered please