Kevin Meynell

Well they must still be going some to burn through GBP 750K per year!

Indeed so. In fact, there are quite a few historical examples of such things, e.g. the British quay in Shanghai, the French port of Pondicherry in India, and the Pakistani town of Gwadar that belonged to Oman. In fact, there was even part of England that belonged to Wales!

Okay, but then where is the money that BSI pay the FIM for the SGP rights going?

Apparently the idea came from the true wartime story of the Canadian parliament turning the maternity wing of a hospital into Dutch territory. This allowed the exiled Dutch Queen to give birth on Dutch soil, which is apparently necessary to inherit the throne.

You're quite right - the phrasing wasn't very good.

But are you from Berwick?

How long before Berwick asks for its own parliament as well? After all, it used to be treated separately to England and Scotland is technically still at war with Russia as a result!

Rico, It's rumoured that the FIM pay the prize money themselves. Perhaps 'The Know' would like to confirm or deny this?

I think there need to be less GPs rather than more. They should just stick with the prestige events with perhaps 1 or 2 rotating around the smaller countries. Britain, Denmark, Poland, Sweden, Czech Republic, possibly Germany, and Norway/Finland/Slovenia/Italy. The series should only go to more than six rounds if these are held outside Europe (e.g. Australia or US).

I believe there is an general FIM rule that restricts each country to one GP per year in each motorcycle discipline. That's why the Gothenburg and Bydgoszcz GPs are officially the Scandinavian and European respectively. In addition, with the exception of regional GPs, I think GPs must carry the title of their host federation - 'Great Britain' in the case of the ACU. I therefore think an English GP wouldn't be allowed on both counts.

I imagine the CEO's GBP 350K accounts for a good proportion of that wage bill.

I'm sure crowds could be improved if the four rounds were all held at different tracks in each country. However, even if this isn't feasible, both Semi-Finals could be staged as double-header at one track, using the 16-heat 4TT format for each. The same format could be used for Last Chance and Final.

Plans are one thing, but reality is another. This said, I don't have a problem with the size of the SGP being cut, particularly if it makes it easier to hold rounds outside Europe. I also think it should make the series more competitive, because they are simply not enough riders of the required standard at the moment. However, all this is simply going back to the way the SGP was in the first place. Fine, but I suspect that if things hadn't changed, fewer and fewer riders would have been willing to take part in the series, particularly if there are plans to charge them to enter in the first place. BTW - you still have not enlightened us as to what relationship you have with BSI.

Riders carried the same number throughout the series, but there was a draw before each GP to determine the riding order.

It doesn't matter, but let's not pretend the changes are for competitive reasons. The SGP prize money hasn't increased in years, and this is the cheapest way of giving the riders a pay rise (although it will be interesting to see if all the surplus prize money is re-distributed to the remaining riderra). The other reason is probably to reduce the costs of a GP, thus encouraging more venues to stage one.

The biggest problem with the current format is that gate positions are a complete lottery. If you have the misfortune to be off the worst gate twice, then your meeting can be over very quickly. The current format is arguably exciting, but fair it is most certainly not. It's long past time for a change.

The way it used to be in fact? Of course, I suppose the real reason for reducing the number of riders has nothing to do with saving money? Well, it worked for 60 years before the knockout lottery was introduced.

The four knockout heats would decide the top eight positions - the Final decides the top four positions, 3rd and 4th in Heat 23 would finish 5th and 6th overall, whilst 3rd and 4th in Heat 21 would finish 7th and 8th overall. The race points in Heats 1-20 would simply decide who qualifies, and the choice of gate positions in Heats 21 and 22. I hadn't really thought about how to award GP points. The problem with using a combination of race points and GP points is that a 9th-placed (non-qualifying) rider can score anything from 4 to 11 race points, and simply adding bonus points to existing race points could mean that a winner of a GP could end-up with less GP points than another rider. I think I would just award GP points based on final placings in each GP. Race points would still be important for improving a rider's placing.

I would change the format of the knockout races, so that higher placed riders get a second chance if they miss out in their first race. For example... Heat 21: 5th to 8th placed riders (3rd and 4th eliminated) Heat 22: 1st to 4th placed riders Heat 23: 3rd and 4th in Heat 22, 1st and 2nd in Heat 21 (3rd and 4th eliminated) Heat 24: 1st and 2nd Heat 22, 1st and 2nd Heat 23

It's actually difficult to come-up with a perfect system that combines the old 20-heat format with the 'excitement' of sudden-death races. The old 16-rider GP format was a reasonable compromise, but the C and D-Finals were a bit of a waste of time. I suppose an 8-rider straightforward knockout event after the 20-heats is okay, although I'd like to see the qualifiers with the most points getting to choose their gate positions, rather than have a ballot as this season. I doubt that casual fans will sit down and score the meeting by hand. They'll rely on the television captions. Cricket is a much more complicated sport than speedway, yet fans still understand how the scoring works (except when the Duckworth-Lewis mechanism is being used ;-)). Even if they don't, they can let television do the calculations for them.

The German system might make sense, but I'm pretty sure the SGP will use the format they trialled in the WC Qualifiers this season (i.e. knockout semi-finals). I can't imagine how you'd explain to the casual viewer that the rider winning the final is not necessarily the overall winner!

I haven't see it in writing yet, but that would be my understanding.

I don't really know why there is so much confusion over the format. Next year's format was trialled during this season's WC qualifying and the World U-21 rounds and is pretty simple - the top eight after 20 heats qualify for knockout semi-finals. The first two in each of those qualify for the final. No carrying points forward or anything like that.

With the greatest of respect to the Slovenian hosts, what a joke this competition has become. Teams tracking 'ringers', and teams from countries that don't even have a league competition. This is the one UEM competition that is fairly unique and could be very good, but it's just being reduced to a farce.

There isn't really any reason for promotion and relegation in speedway. There are a limited number of teams, and no overdemand for places at any level. Until that happens, it would just be an artificial exercise.