THE DEAN MACHINE

cheers mate, i do find it strange how the rule was left out of the NL agm press release

yea loved it at berwick and still love to go there ,dont think berwick fans could understand my accent though but fantastic people ,will be there this saturday spannerman for hynek

you poor soul

hey mate ,thank you i think some people think older riders are creaming money from riding in the nl ,i can say speedway at all levels has cost me thousands of pounds over 18 years , last year i brought 3 GMs and a jrm , i blew 2 of them , i had a huge crash at newport which totaly wrecked a bike and what earned last year didnt even cover that cost of them , and i can tell you that 60% of youngsters were on more money than me and the others were on the same money , did you notice how i seemed to be in a lot of challenge/individual meetings the last few years ?, thats cause when the phone rang to ask if i wanted to do them my first responce wasnt "how much money am i getting" ,i just wanted to ride , i can understand if a team wants to track a team of up and coming youngsters, thats up to them its their choice but if a team wants to track an older team or a team with a mix of older riders then surely thats their choice aswell , a rider shouldnt be descriminated against because of his age , i know len silver agrees with that and so do some other promoters but unfortunatly some dont and they seem to have the most say, restricting riders cause of age will not make a new british world champion ,there are a couple of riders who could do something big in the sport currently riding NL and they got there with older riders in the league , but its when they go into prem/elite the bubble bursts, maybe the bspa should be looking at that and not blaming the likes of me for halting their progress , unfortunatly for me i care about speedway especially at NL level and decisions like this 30+ rule are doing nothing for the sport

name 1 younger rider in the 17 years of the cl/nl that hasnt got a place cause an older rider has had the place , if they are good enough they will be in , last year the isle of wight had a league match at buxton and we couldnt get a rider to ride at no7, there was just no rider availible or that wanted to do it , we got someone from the amature scene in the end and without being disrespectfull to the lad he was half a lap behind ,that is not good for the paying public to watch , in the return match buxton had the same problems getting a team and had to use another teams no7 cause again no one was availible or wanted to do it , i ride in the nl for fun cause i enjoy it ,its not about the money or that i cant hack it in the prem (which i cant but thats not the point ), i think after a few weeks when injuries start to happen the league will again fall short of riders ,but this year no one over 30 will be able to fill the gaps so even more teams will have to put in riders not up to the standered , again the paying public suffers , i understand this sounds a bit like sour grapes on my part but ive been around speedway a long time and see what goes on in speedway and imo this rule is just depriving the NL fans

i have often wondered if there is some sort of goverment/lottery grant if they call it development cause i cant see any other reason why they would want to call it that , the way speedway is run that wouldnt supprise me

i have a couple of views about the NL/3RD division , first i dont think me or buzz or any of the older riders has ever stopped a young rider getting a place in the league , if they couldnt get a place it was more down to their ability than anything else , and imo calling the 3rd division a development/training or whatever you want to call it league is holding the league back , yes it is a league for young riders to learn and start out in the sport but speedway at all levels is a form of entertainment and the public are the wage payers, im speaking as a fan now when i say if i watch speedway i want to see great races not a trainng school ,i want to see the best that division can offer , i dont care if the riders are 70 or 15 years old , i just want to see great racing , i think their are some great stylish young riders in the NL but their are also some older riders that give good entertainment and surely thats what speedway is about , i know many promoters lost sight of the aspect of entertainment years ago but speedway needs them to get it back at all levels , calling it the national development league just says amature and dosent make me want to watch it ,so why would any new supporters

i agree with most of what you say here, except me and you have worked in speedway long enough to know a good idea for the benifit of speedway will only happen as long as the boys club is on to an earner,imo the hackney idea wouldnt have happened if it wasnt for the dudley success, but the dudley success isnt down to just useing a famous speedway name and riding somewhere else , in the 14 years it was without a track it never went away ,speedway in dudley is big and has always been big always in the local papers ,it is almost a political issue round here and that hasnt happened to hackney,i think hackney will be a success at hackney but not this venture , for the good of speedway i hope im wrong

i just think this is silver/cook trying to cash in on the name hackney , they have seen what has happened with dudley and think its a way to make money , but you have to live in the black country to understand dudleys success, they have both been without a track for nearly the same time but they are worlds apart in fan base , there are 2 issues in the black country area which get major newspaper coverage ,one is the proposed mosque and the other is a track for cradley/dudley ,its been like that for years ,not just in the sports sections either, im not knocking hackney and i hope it succeeds ,but i just feel that some promoters are running short of ideas to make money and will exploit any idea they can , if it attracts old fans back then great and i hope it is the start of some way to get hackney back in hackney but i dont think thats what this venture is about , also i feel £12 is to expensive for NL racing ,speedway in general has got to take a couple of steps back and start to get people goin to watch speedway again and charging them alot of money isnt the way to do it especially in the current climate when money is tight for a lot of people ,

chris harris

it gets worse

nothing would suprise me in british speedway at the moment

add the isle of wight to that list of frustration

plymouth is only 200 miles from the midlands ,80 miles past somerset ,hardly the end of the earth is it , if it was refused it wasnt because of location

maybe there will be a couple of suprises for the NL next season

march

i see old righteous one has spouted his wisdom ,you really should get the job of running speedway ,

while i agree with the 2 points here ,restricting commonweath riders and riders wanting £20+ a point ,the fact is introduce those 2 rules and there will be a major shortfall in riders for next season , this year when injuries start there isnt enough riders to go round now ,i think introduce those rules and you rule out half the current riders maybe more, but i agree something needs to be done, and just for the record i am not on £20 a point so this isnt a personal gripe for me

yep ill be celebrating in style by washing my bikes

we didnt deserve 4th place ,team GB did us proud, i think we were unlucky to get outside gates when the track was soaked but thats the way it goes ,well done to the poles and every nation that competed in a fantastic world cup ,proud to be a brit

very sad news , jean was a lovely friendly lady who became a good friend from my time at mildenhall , my thoughts are with ray and her family, DEAN

It was a great and gutsy performance last night, and we did nothing wrong ,it really came down to one race ,heat 23 Danny tried to go down the outside of a AJ and AJ ru him out wide and put danny at the back , if Danny had got another few inches infront of AJ he would of dropped it on AJ and i think we would be talking about a different result today ,sometimes in speedway the difference between wining and losing is the matter of inches and last night was a perfect example of that, it dosent matter who the five riders were as long as they give it everything and they did, it was a great nights speedway and im am very proud of TEAM GB.

just watched it back on sky i dont think that scott is that hard on emil , yes he does run him wide but not right out to the fence and when there is a tiny bit of contact scott has already got his wheels in line and is making his exit from the corner, i would say emil clipped scotts dirt deflector rather than the other way round, what happend after that was handbags at 20 paces, a great night really enjoyed it , referee was crap .