martinmauger

I almost always stay to watch anf mini matches or 2nd halves, you've already paid entry to watch speedway to why not. At Hull Craven Park, we had a 10pm curfew and unless there were any incedents the main match often ended at 9.25-9.35 and we got used to 2 and 3-rider races. The odd Hull team rider might test equipment, and possibly another laegue rider, but pretty much it was the same few juniors / 2nd halfers getting in as much track time as they could keep fuelling and prepping their bikes. Think it was only 2003 when a proper season long 2nd half competition took place of 4 'teams' representing Hull(!) or the odd challenge v the likes of Boston, Scunny, Redcar etc, featuring the likes of Rob Hollingworth, Adam Allot, Richard Hall, Josh Auty....

Charles Ochiltree ended up paying Ian Thomas 15,000 pounds for Olsen's services, bit a farce but then so was forcing a rider to go where he clearly didn't want to be. Hull ended up signing Barry Briggs for the 1976 season, were an average once more in 1977 and signed Ivan Mauger for the Vikings from Exeter for 12,000 pounds (pound sign won't work on my keyboard) for the 1978 season. It's a fascinating story all detailed in Ian Thomas's excellent book "Wheels And Deals". While happy with Briggos' signing in 1976, and especially Mauger in 1978 (can you tell!), I often wondered how Olsen and the Vikings would have fared had Ole ridden for Hull. Hmm....

I forget which season (1971-73) but at the annual Hull Fair, Viking Tony Childs once had a spin on the wall of death....

Agreed. It's all about circulating til the pitstops, which is all the commentators talk about, then get out again quickest as a way of overtaking the other chap as opposed to racing him on the circuit a la Mansell & Senna. Few characters one can identify with and follow these days....

I walked all round the stadium most the terracing, back straight & turn 2, was ok but the area around turn 1 just past thr main stand was like a building site very uneven, rough gound, temporary fencing, a lot of pushing & shoving and I saw a few of people fall. Mind there was 37,000 there, I believe, and the track was good with some decent racing in between rain showers. But the thread is about The New Belle Vue and the place looks more than decent...

Indeed, the words 'oh, and a speedway track' almost need tacking on at the very end of the project's mission statement....

Ah interesting, thought it could have meant the engine mounted more to one side. E.g. if you look closely at a pic of Mauger's gold bike, the frame appears twisted. It is, Ivan himself told he had it so 'adjusted' to provided a better ride at Wroclaw, the venue of his 1970 win; obviously it worked. Thanks to all who replied, some reading to be done then....

Not opening can of worms but surely no one would begrudge the Aces management making a few quid considering what they have delivered. Maybe the prices are just for the opener, which I can't get to, it also struck me it's going to be a bit close timewise. I went to the 1985 Wold Final at Bradford and seem to recall fans being kept waiting outside as Odsal wasn't quite finished, mind it defo wasn't finished when they finally did let folk in ....

In a previous life i did a lot of mechanicking (cars, bikes, maintenance, tuning, road, off-road, 2-stroke, 4-stroke, etc) but a change of career means I'm somewhat out of the loop and rarly get my hands dirty so could someone please explain exactly what is meant by an off-set engine? I've racked my brains a bit but to be honest I can't imagine what it means, sorry if it's already been answered....

How'd they get rid of the snow (!). Good progress and fascinating stuff for a self-confessed track anorak like me....

I was once chatting to an unamed, current Premeir League heat leader with Elite League experience about his bike and asked about the tappet, or valve, clearences as I thought his bike sounded a bit 'top endy' i.e slight rattle coming from the cylinder head. He said he didn't know as his dad took care of such things. I went on to ask him, for my own interest not to try and catch him out at all, about the clutch adjustment (free play in the cable, riders almost always adjust this on the start line), chain adjustment & lubricating, tyre pressure, dropping (changing) the oil, changing the air filter and he just kept saying "dunno, my dad does all of that stuff". So I asked about filling the tank as some riders re-fill it after a start and 30yds just before the re-run, was it filled to the brim or the bottom of the filler neck (turns out it's the latter), he replied "like I said mate, I dunno about any of the mechanical stuff, my dad does it all for me, I just ride the bike". He almost always scores well and is never without a team so I guess works for him, that said not every rider will know, or possibly wants to know, about all aspects of the bike but his lack of knowledge in regard to basic maintenance really surprised me....

Having mechanicked in the pits and briefly dipped my toe in riding a 500, I do know how to start a speedway engine from cold but I have seen riders (even pros) as soon as the engine starts hold the throttle wide open with the entire bike almost jumping off the stand. Has to be seen and heard to be believed, but from a distance. Rev limiters may not be THE answer but I rekcon would at least be a start in cost reduction. Standard engines owned by tracks and hnaded out out via picking a number out a crash helmet would be a good idea but the startup costs would be termendous. Do clubs A) buy 8, 7 + 1 spare, standard engines or do riders sell their existing motors for standard internal components fitted: cam, piston, clyinder head & barrel, crank, valves, etc. (Ignore the emoticon, it appeared by itself and won't delete) One thing never mentioned in the 1998 honda experiment is that while Honda may well have been offloading some surplus 650cc enduro engines, though there is no actual evidence of this, is reliability would have drastically improved and in the future they would in all likelyhood manufacture and supply a unit designed specifically for the job, minus the redundant inertnal gearbox. All conjecture now of course, but no one seems to have a solution. But we all seem to be in agreement something needs to be done to reduce costs & speed to hopefully make for better racing and also noise as ever more stringent laws are being enforced on speedway tracks....

Shale shmale, Hull's 1995 opener at Craven Park was raced on the track base (!) Not by choice, I should point out, the shale was delivered either too late to lay it or to lay and grade properly, time was getting on so the show went on. I should also point out the surface took half the 1st season to settle down and that previously ridden on base not show through. A practice / track test at Belle Vue would probably for the best but there is a mytique thing of the first bikes on track being meeting 1, heat 1. Not long to go.......

Probably the best, most cost effecive method would be an homolgated rev limter (say 14,000RPM) in corporated intot trh ignition system, as described this week's Star by Peter Johns. That way all riders can keep all their existing equipment, apart from the ignition system. Most engine damage occurs when riders hold the throttle wide open at the start and when in the pits - especially when starting the bike from cold . Don't have the time or inclincation for an engineering discussion but ask anyone mechanically informed, particularly bikers, about the effects of revving a 500cc 4-stroke single cylinder engine to 14k RPM and above ....

The mystery to me is how Aces fans are able to sleep - I couldn't if something similar happened in Hull. When the track was being built at Craven Park in early 1995 I used to bunk off college every week to check on progress and never really beleived it wasn't a dream until I spent an excellent couple of hours standing in the mud talking to Paul Smith, Nigel Crabtree, Lee Dicken & Grenville Dicken. After all that I missed the press day due to illness, but hey hoe. Having some knowledge of trying for a new track / stadium, believe me what Chris Morton, David Gordon, etc have pulled off is something close to a miracle getting the new stadium and I'm not at all surprised it has taken as (relatively) long as it has. The very best of luck to all connected with Belle Vue....

I couldn't even name a single player of any Hull footie or rugby teams. My only passing interest has been when both rugby teams were in the position (i.e. about to go under) of requiring the extra income speedway brought. Speedway's pretty much the only sport for me, plus some other motorsports....

Jumping in, with Guy Martin what you see is what you get: a guy (no pun intended) with a genuine interest in people and machines / vehicles which go quickly prefarably driven by an engine. A mate was involved in a Red Bull Soap Box Derby event, Guy turned up (forget whether he was part of a team or not), he chatted to everyone like he'd known them all his life and was happy to get involved, pick up a spanner and get his hands dirty. I'd be very surprised if he didn't at least have a skid on a speedway bike, find out what made it tick, then have look over the fence at the kart circuit and have spin in a kart. Love him or not, this is a the kind of guy he is: one you'd really want to be interested in speedway....

Sudden Sam also took the odd, seemingly needless spill at Hull in 1999. Brilliant to watch when he stayed on his bike and was 'on it' though....

Mentioned this to a mate who reckoned Joe Owen also had his wrist slapped for such transgressions. But surely it reasonable for a rider to glance round to check what is happening during a race provided he doesn't endanger either himself or the opposition. Personally it annoys me when in a team event, unless it's say a Fast Track Rider v a GP rider, a rider makes an 'off like a scalded cat'-type start and promptly disappears into the distance without any curiosity as to what is ocurring behind him....

At Hull in 1980 I recall that Dennis Sigalos (almost certainly) and in 1981 the late Bily Sanders (defiinately) being warned for looking behind too often. Difficult to understand as they were both very good riders so very rarely crashed, were often leading or at least at the front and being heat leaders their job was to make the best out of each heat. Don't recall Mauger looking back that much, apart from team riding, having tremendous spacial awarenes he always somehow knew exactly where the opposition were on the track....

Same here in East Yorkshire where it's been a 'mere' 11 years without speedway but seems much, much longer. Sigh, ....

This ^^^. Monarchs v Belle Vue and Glasgow bringing Coventry up for their opener: now THAT's what I all promoting. Put on something way different for the fans and teams they woudn't normally see at PL level, hope it's a bumper night for both clubs. Good stuff....

Ain't it always the way. Annoying if the Star is late but on the rare occasional copy hasn't turned up at all, I've phoned Dave Fairbrother and a replacement has arrived the very next day. Though I no longer have team to follow (sob) I very much look forward to my 'Thursday lunchtimes away from the inane chatter of workmates' and i must say the mag is stonking value at just over 2 quid if one 'subs' it. No, I don't work for publishers Pinegen. Good issue this week; if only the Engalnd v USA test at Wimbledon in 1980 had been filmed....

Moving not really off topic but slight sideways (!), it has always baffled me why motorcycle road racing (MotoGP, Superbikes, etc) is so massively popular. And not just the big events, where 10,000's watch, but club meetings too. The viewing is often appalling, you pay the Earth to stand 1/4 mile away from one part of the track, the riders come round once every minute and a half and someone has passed someone else - maybe - or not even arrived at all on the next lap and the chances are you won't have seen what happened, a dozen races if you are lucky. Unless somoene like Rossi is going for it, the riders follow each other around the track waiting for a mistake, but as we know speedway riders often race side by side and around the outside. The big bike companies are involved of course but the bikes themselves hardly resemble bikes you can buy to ride on the road, and yes, I was a keen biker myself once but it does liitle for me. Yet I can watch the, apparent, borefest pit-stop to pit-stop race that is F1, from beginning to end. That said, road racing events do, and have alomst always, attract huge crowds....

Weren't the starts great all night, i.e. a joke, even Mauger struggled with them. Another surprising 'rule' in those days was that a race wasn't necessarily stopped after a rider had fallen and was still on the track. Not the last time this happened at least in a Wolrd Final; Olsen in 1974, Muller in 1976 and Mauger again in 1978. Strange meeting in '73 though, has to be said that Szczakiel was the right winner on the night due to scoring more points than anyone else due to not crashing or being exluded. But how sweet would it have been for Mauger to have passed Szczakiel around turns 1 & 2 as he originally planned. Still........