Humphrey Appleby

I'd have thought that's a pre-requisite...

But there's a lot of more availability and choice in London, especially if you're not going by car. Yes, you can drive out to the Travel Inn on the M4 at Cardiff, but it's not a place I'd particularly want to spend a weekend. Errr.. yes, but London is a world city so you fully expect that, and it has numerous sights, attractions and events, not to mention ways of getting there. Cardiff, with all due respect, has little of this. If I go to New York, I expect to pay a lot for accommodation. If I go to Dover, Delaware, I don't and won't.

Well yes, but regardless of who's to blame, this is a factor that will determine whether someone attend the event or not. In a larger city with plenty of choice though, it's still easier to find a range of accommodation. Charging 120+ quid a night for a Travel Inn is an absolute disgrace under any circumstances.

I can totally understand the greater certainty that a roof brings, but is the lack of one so insurmountable? If the right materials are used, and adequate equipment is on hand, then it's possible to put on a meeting in quite inclement conditions. Indeed, how many World Finals were rained off, and for that matter, how many GPs have been?

It isn't just through Newport - it's often very congested on the English side. Try getting into them when there's an event on.... I'm also not interested in faffing around with a park and ride these days. At Wembley you can drive right up to the stadium and park there, or take a train to the station directly outside. The hotels are an outrageous price for one. I've not actually suggested that Cardiff is inaccessible and has nothing if you want to make a weekend of it. Indeed, I probably go to Cardiff a couple of times per year for other things. However, it's certainly not as accessible as somewhere in London would be for most people, it's certainly less attractive for foreign attendees, and if you intend to stay, then the accommodation is well overpriced for what's on offer. Of course London is more expensive, but it's for more convenient for most people to reach and there's more there for the non-diehards, Yes, the diehards will go anywhere (as indeed I once did), but I still believe a London GP would attract more casual fans.

I'm fairly sure that I actually read about the rumours of the German GP moving to Bydgoszcz in the Speedway Star before it happened, so if anything started the conspiracy theory, it was probably that. I'm well aware of how a series of coincidences can seem like a pre-mediated plan in hindsight, but it's hardly in the realms of UFOs that BSI had some some concerns over the shipping and storage of the track materials that might have led to contingency plans drawn up.

I suspect we're unlikely to hear the true story about Gelsenkirchen.

I 'only' live 2-3 hours from Cardiff (and actually my 'other place' is one of the few cities that have a direct flight to Cardiff). However, it involves a drag down a congested motorway, paying the outrageous bridge toll, and then having to park in some distant car park because there's no parking at (or anywhere near) the stadium itself. No problem, go by train instead, but then you'd better forget about getting home after the event. None of this is insurmoutable if you're a diehard, but it's not very appealing for the casual fan. Fair enough, a lot of people enjoy the Cardiff weekend and good luck to them, but I suspect a London GP would be actually be more attractive for many. If the LDA or similar quango in London was willing to stump up more cash than the Welsh Assembly to host the GP at the Olympic Stadium, I also suspect we'd see a dramatic change of heart from Mr Rising... Speaking of which, it seems the Gorzow City Councillors are questioning the contract signed with BSI to stage the GP there. The Council Treasurer reportedly said GBP 412K was paid in two installments by the city in 2011, with the speedway club itself paying GBP 112.5K for the privilege of staging the GP. So much for the confidentiality clause...

The Millennium Stadium isn't a speedway stadium, so it's not really a fair comparison. I personally think the new Wembley, the Emirates and even Twickenham are better stadia than the Millenium although they're not really suitable for speedway or have the advantage of a roof. Personally, I don't like indoor stadiums very much, but I can see they're advantageous for speedway.

I don't fundamentally have a problem with the GP being at Cardiff, although it's somewhat academic as I haven't been for a few years. If you're coming from the Midlands, North or even West by car it's got decent enough links, but by air or rail less so. The stadium is pretty good and you can pretty much guarantee that the meeting will go ahead (although Gelsenkirchen was also a covered stadium ). It's also quite clear that a GP at Wembley is no realistic proposition, and indeed even talk of the Olympic Stadium is premature. However, lets be clear that the GP is primarily in Cardiff because it's convenient for BSI for it to be there. If a deal could be struck to have a GP in London, I suspect Cardiff would be dropped fairly quickly and after a couple of years, everyone would have forgotten what all the fuss was about. What was interesting, was that BSI's parent company seemed to be involved in bid to take over and run the Olympic Stadium post-2012 which I'd have guessed might have made a GP there a realistic proposition. However, they somehow contrived to lose a lot of money on that enterprise and have apparently pulled out of the erm... running.

Sorry, but you simply can't convince me that Cardiff is more accessible than Wembley; neither internationally nor even within the UK. I have tried it and the public transport is poor, the facilities in the city are limited and expensive, and Cardiff has little to offer beyond the event itself regardless of it's supposed status as a capital city. I can understand that Cardiff might be a cost effective venue for BSI, and has the bonus of being covered, but let's not pretend it's for the convenience of the fans.

City, and apparently a county as well these days...

In those days, the fans would just have got wet. These days there's television schedules to think about, and as BSI derives a significant proportion of its income from that, they've obviously got to take that into consideration. That said, the 1992 World Final was interrupted by a huge downpour, and they still managed to complete it after they brought in a fire engine to pump off the water. Was it Jack Rollin who was working for the Speedway Star at the time, who famously objected to the World Final being moved anywhere but Wembley? Errr.. yes, but that's because the pitch was deliberately laid on pallets that could be moved. I suspect the likes of Wembley and Twickenham would be more reticent about having their hallowed turf damaged.

I didn't, and I wouldn't quibble over the odd discrepancy in quoted attendance figures. However, it does raise some interesting questions as to what attendances really are, or more to the point, what the paying attendances are.

It's difficult to think where else a GP could be held in Britain at moment. Coventry would be the only suitable speedway venue, and even that's too small. All the other largish stadia are for rectangular sports, with the exception perhaps of the likes of Crystal Palace and Don Valley who I'd guess wouldn't be too happy to have a speedway track laid over their nice running tracks. Nobody seems to question the attendance figures at Cardiff though, so how do we know it's actually getting 40K paying spectators given that the FIM doesn't appear to publish these figures any more? Even when they did, the figures for a number of GPs were suspiciously rounded. I admittedly haven't been to the Cardiff GP for a few years now, but the last time I did, I wouldn't have estimated the attendance at much more than 30K going on the number of sections that were filled.

That though indicates the problem. Multi-use stadia haven't been able to pay their way in recent years, and the pressure on land is such that housing and other development becomes more attractive. With respect to the London catchment area though, to me London is really four or five different regions and rarely the twain shall meet. When I lived in North London, I rarely ventured sarf of the Thames and even more rarely east of the Lea, and that seemed to be the same for most people. Rye House was easier to get to than Hackney, and certainly much easier than Wimbledon.

I think though, it's generally acknowledged that the Orange Man took a bath on the London Lions. Aside from Wimbledon, there are/were various greyhound stadiums in Greater London that could potentially stage speedway are there not?

I think it's more likely that BSI want to keep Cardiff as their showcase event for various reasons. Polish cities possibly also have more scope to throw public money around than UK authorities.

Given how much money IMG have lost in the UK in recent times, I'd have thought some heads would have already rolled.

I appreciate this is your cause célèbre and I wouldn't entirely disagree that London probably could support a track at some level if a stable home could be found. However, the fact that several potential stadiums in the Greater London area aren't chasing after speedway is surely indicative of the level of interest. In addition, the last time top flight speedway was held in London at what was in effect the old Hackney Stadium, it was a financial disaster and didn't last more than a season if memory serves correctly. There clearly was a lot of interest in London in the past, but the demographics have changed hugely in the past 20-30 or so years. The sport just doesn't seem to occupy the interest of the average Londoner these days.

It doesn't mean the whole population attends or even likes a particular sport. In New Zealand, rugby union is immensely popular, and even club rugby gets higher attendances than in England, despite that country having a fraction of the population. Speedway is quite localised to specific areas of Britain as well, and it wouldn't surprise me if Sweden has a comparable number of fans. The fact that London has as many people as the whole of Sweden doesn't mean a lot, as most people in the capital aren't interested in speedway as evidenced by the lack of tracks. I'd hazard a guess there are about 25-30K reasonably regular speedway fans in Britain, and maybe the same number again who used to go and/or watch it on television.

I've sat through several presentations about transponders, so I'm well aware of the cost. A decent timing loop system as used in other motorsports with 20 transponders is in the order of GBP 4K, and that's probably before any sort of discount. If the premier speedway competition can't find that sort of money as a one-off investment, then times really must be tough... I'd agree the positioning of the transponder is a bit of a issue in speedway, as the finish line rules would need to be modified. Similarly, the ideal position for the transponder towards the front of the bike would make it vulnerable to being knocked off. However, none of this is insurmountable and provided the positioning is the same for all bikes, it shouldn't matter too much. Hardly surprising as it's the British Speedway Forum. Perhaps if one went to the Polish equivalent, one would find the complaints to be almost exclusive to Poland...

Interesting. The official line is that the 'old' BSI had taken things as far as they could, and IMG would take the SGP to a higher level. To be honest, although individual racing is not my thing, I wouldn't have any objections if the SGP developed into a standalone circus. However, it still seems miles away from that. Pretty unbelievable that transponders are still not being used as its cheap and well proven technology now. I don't see that as being a real argument. When the knockout format was used, the fans and television never knew who was going to be in which heat. They had to get out their pens and write in the riders names themselves (and television producer must have done the proverbial same thing). In fact, if you use the 'continental style' programme layout for the current format, you only need to write in a riders name once, and that's even ignoring the iPhone type apps that are becoming more prevalent. I'd agree there's a stronger argument that you want all the GP regulars to be in the Saturday event and taking at least five rides, but my suggestion is more to hold qualifying between non-regulars such as wildcards. Two track reserves already have to turn up without the guarantee of any rides at all, so giving a few riders 2 or 3 rides and the chance to qualify for the GP proper would be better than what happens now. Some suitable format could surely be devised if the will were there, but it's not really about the fans, is it?

It was apparently okay for 24 riders to go all the way to Australia for the possibility of just two rides, so what's different now? New Zealand is obviously a bit of an extreme example, but you could still use the qualifying to determine the local wildcard. You'll have to pay/persuade a couple of local track reserves to turn up anyway, so at least it would give them something to race for and add a bit of interest to the practice sessions. We're told that riders turn up to the SGP for the glory and honour of racing in the World Championship rather than the money, so on that basis, surely it shouldn't be so hard to persuade some riders to take part in a qualifying session...?

That was apparently never an issue until the prize money needed to be upped, and rather than the FIM/BSI erm... digging deep, the way to do it was to cut the number of riders and revert to the old World Championship format. The qualifying heats could be comprised of a mixture of one-off wildcards or near qualifiers whom you might want to experience a GP. However, regardless of how you run practice/qualifying, riders would turn up if the rewards were sufficient. You only have to look at F1 in the not-so-distant past, where teams would turn up to Pre-Qualifying on a Friday morning just to try and get into the main Qualifying session that itself didn't even guarantee a place on the starting grid.