mikebv

Excellent post THJ... For me it always comes down to finance, so if there is any racing it probably only should be done by those who can either comfortably finance any losses or feel that their buisness plan, (with all the Covid 19 restrictions), can deliver a profit.. And those who fall within that criteria may be very few in numbers I would think.. Personally, I think a season of no losses/minimal losses, for the vast majority of teams who seem to lose high five figure sums annually, might not be the worst scenario in the world. Especially if they use the money saved as a promotional budget next year, to really make an impact both locally as an independent business, and nationally as a BSPL collective..

As a Supermarket manager I can 1000% concur....

Not sure why you can't do both.. Do BV at the very start of the year (as you say great racing to launch the series), and then do Cardiff maybe as the penultimate one, so hopefully all still up for grabs, meaning no threat to crowd levels dropping, which could happen if you run the last GP when all could be done and dusted. (Leave that to the Poles who can guarantee a crowd).. A 10k crowd at the NSS paying £25 to £30, around five months before Cardiff, wouldn't impact the GP crowd levels in Wales I would suggest.. Suppose it depends on how much the organisers want for the rights to hold a GP at the NSS...

And at most football and rugby matches you are stood shoulder to shoulder, or sat next to, another human being, meaning body heat is shared.... At a lot of Speedway meetings you would be stood in splendid isolation or have a row (or even a block) of seats to yourself.. No issues with social distancing though which can only be a positive... Let's be honest, the sport struggles to get a big following in June, July and August, every year, so getting one in November will be a big challenge, however as November would probably be play off time, maybe that would entice a decent following away from their warm armchairs? And keeping the league to one home and one away, should mean most clubs are in with a play off chance through the often equally as cold October. The last thing any club would want is a few 'dead rubbers' on cold and miserable evenings as that could decimate the fan base on those nights... For me, if due to non availability of riders, you end up with contrived septets across the sport, which will seriously undermine any competition, added to the fact many say they lose considerable amounts of money every season.. Maybe it would just be better to bank the cash they usually lose and use it to market the club to come back stronger next year?

Spot on... Just like in 12 months time A and E depts will be full of drunken bastards effing and jeffing at overworked, underpaid nurses because they have had to wait a few hours to get treatment for self inflicted wounds. .

I think it will mean the biggest crowd in years....

Agreed, however.. A proper professional sport should have such decisions made by its governing body, and not unilaterally by individual members of that organisation... As that just leads to chaos as each member seeks out getting their own way based on their own needs and wants.. Fair play to Glasgow for their leadership on this matter, however the sport has a National leadership team who should be leading the way forward and agreeing the process to be followed..

Have you moved into Speedway promotion Ray?

And no other clubs in the history of speedway have manipulated the (deliberately?) ambiguous rules for their own end?

Watching clips of football from the past decade or so, there is also a huge amount of players who just seem to have 'dissapeared', with many teams having wholesale changes in squads in around just five years or so.. My lad is in a League One U17 youth team and the competition for places is incredible at that level with young lads coming through all the time trying to get into that first team, and experienced players dropping down into it from the two divisions above... Often the players dropping down have been replaced by either purchased foreign imports, or foreign imports who have been at the clubs from eleven years old, such is the huge 'trawler net' used these days by the leading clubs.. At my lads club, only three players in the first team squad have been there over three years, with many ending up non league and working full time when their contract ends, as the next batch of younger lads have come through to replace them, or better players from the leagues above have dropped in, desperate to remain a pro and try and get back up the levels.. For the vast majority of pro footballers their 'shelf life' is nowadays shorter than ever given supply well exceeds demand...

Without going 'all our yesterdays', watching the many various meetings on YouTube from the 80's showed just how it worked too.. Crowds seemed to be very healthy indeed when compared to today.. Hardly any full time professionals on show, and all mainly with one decent bike and a 'good enough' spare.. The best riders were also in the main, the only ones who rode in the top league at the same time, and for many of them it was a 'toe being dipped into the water' to see if they could compete at that level before moving up permanently, rather than the necessity it has become for dozens of riders of various standard so they can earn more to afford the cost of riding.. It was interesting to read Shawn Morans interview in the SS a couple of weeks back where he said he got £35 a point riding for Sheffield in the early 90's. That's equivalent to £88 a point today. I wonder how many world class No1's in the top league ride for £88 a point today? (And given their outgoings even be anywhere able to afford to).. Indeed. Could you get away with paying £88 a point to a second tier No1 nowadays? As you say, they had a pretty good business model, heaven knows how they lost sight of it..

Been the obvious next step for around the last decade or so... Yet, for some reason, British Promoters have steadfastly chosen to have their businesses hugely adversely impacted by running disjointed fixture lists, using many contrived septets of borrowed riders, (to accomodate individual riders own agendas), all on many nights when you wouldn't ordinarily want to be running a 'show' in the entertainment sector.. A very strange business plan..

That's the main reason they run them isn't it? And they are aimed time wise for a global market rather than the UK one, hence the running of them early afternoon behind closed doors, (China does like a bet).. At the old stadium the owners made far, far more from running these events than they got from the Aces..

Worrying times I would think... Councils will be under huge pressure across the country post Covid 19 as budgets from central govt. will no doubt have to be slashed to pay for the billions of pounds of borrowing it has done to pay for the current crisis.. And from what I remember of my visits to Poole, you could get a good many apartments not too far from the waterfront in a 'nice' (and quite expensive) area of the country..

Can only think this kind of thing is inevitable.. And the extra ace up their sleeve may now be this... They now know riders will ride for 50% less than they did so what's to stop them saying that next year "you ride over here exclusively and we will give you 100% money".. Effecively a 100% pay rise...

Spot on there Dean... That piece on Andreas Jonsson was excellent...

Chris is one of those riders who when you watch the racing on YouTube from the past five to ten years or so appears in loads and loads of meetings for a good many various teams, and was often it seems very much an in demand guest.. A rider who came across as someone who gave his absolute all in every race regardless of who he was riding for.. One of those '100% triers' that the sport is built on and the fans often appreciate the most.. Best wishes to him and his family, and let's hope he can overcome his current issues and find himself in a better place in the not too distant future..

Another great read this week.. Best two compliments I can pay it are, one, I now buy it every week and, two, I still have things to read about well into the week after, such are the diverse articles that are in there and the detail that they are covering.. An outstanding magazine, especially given the current situation..

It isnt hard to be pessimistic is it given the already parlous state of the Sport.. If nothing else it may give those who run the sport a moment or two to reflect on why their sport always seems to live on a knife edge re how many teams last the season/start the following one, and provide them with the inspiration to change things.. There does seem to be a few more pro active promotions about now so some maybe have already realised that the 'same old/same old' simply doesnt get the cut through anymore, and actually be able to influence the radical change needed to move the whole sport as an entity forward.. What an opportunity in this enforced break to do so, as when the sport returns I would think it gets a 'free hit' as to what it can put out.. Be interesting to see if tracks do something 'different' and gauge reaction from their output..

If found guilty will he get a % reduction in time for being British..?

I came back to the sport in 88 when the Aces moved to Kirky Lane and watched the first few matches as many riders (probably the majority), found the track somewhat tricky and more than a good few were 'all shapes' on occasions.. He smashed the track record in his first ride.. I remember he rode down the straights with his front wheel slightly off the ground for virtually the whole straight, before bringing it down to execute a perfect turn, never once locking up or finding unwanted drive, but riding every bend as if on rails.. One of those WOW moments some riders can give you..

I've said on another thread.. Watching these old meetings from around 2005 to the present day, I am sure that there were only about 30 riders in total riding in the 2nd Division for about 15 years.. Each year the same riders seemd to turn up riding for someone else.. And then you can add guest appearances too... I think Chris Harris, Rory Schlein and Scott Nicholls must have ridden for everyone at some time..

Probably how German football has ran? And F1 will run? ie. Marshalled and clearly signed as to where you can stand or sit, a list detailing who can come in and how many are allowed to do so, and each person with the correct PPE for their role.. Similar as to how thousands and thousands of businesses have kept running (inside rather than outside) during the crisis..

I do think that there needs to be some kind of grip on reality... Go to the vast majority of supermarkets and you will see no social distancing whatsoever.... My store has had over 200000 visits over the past seven weeks, all within a confined space of less that 15,000 Sq ft.. We let a max 70 in at a time and I can guarantee within one aisle, social distancing goes out of the window.. Some customers do the 'social distancing dance' where they go left, then right, then left again as two people try to avoid each other, but many just walk past others almost touching.. Going to a sporting event in the outdoors, with controls as to who can come in, and when and how many, and only standing or sitting where clearly shown, would be infinitely less risky than going doing your shopping..

To be fair there does need to be the balance to the equation that many of the 'massive' averages were gained with no fixed gate positions, and the No1 usually picked the best every time, and usually only four rides a night with no 'best riders in the last race' which can impact massively averages nowadays.. But even so, running a high 11 plus average was some achievement given that virtually all the best riders in the World rode here at the time and the heat leaders still rode often against each other..