Grand Central

I could not agree more. This is the dilemma ... we all want to see our sport lLIVE but Speedway really does lend itself so well to a little 'editing'. The lack of inane preamble to heat 1 was joyous. And, rather than moan about adbreaks, the improvement was that we came straight back from each one with the riders at the tapes for the next race. Whilst LIVE speedway is essential - for the GPs at least - the broadcasters (and BSI) need to think about the gaps between races that just have to be filled with pap. Reduce them as much as possible. Please. But surely there are huge things to learn for the Elite League. They even hold up the flow of meetings to deliberately include extra rubbish between races. Utter madness. A meeting package starting at 9pm with the crap edited out would be a real winner

Obviously a decision based on rider safety and SPEEDWAY considerations is being discussed. That's why Paul Bellamy is on the track, I suppose.

So a properly arranged session. As I suspected. It was the week, always available sweeping statement that was unlikely.

. Mind you, I doubt that it is feasible anywhere in in the Western world where they take Health and Safety seriously. The number of licenced and fully trained professionals needed to be on hand 'all week' to do this safely is likely to be quite prohibitive. Whilst I could guess that the Torun promotion are able to draw on their 'connections' for many aspects of 'security', management and the like. I am not sure how seven day a week, paramedic, ambulance and doctors facilities can be maintained to, shall we say, 'British' standards. I imagine that the Parsons anecdotal evidence has to be taken with a huge portion of Sodium Chloride. Or will come with large scale caveats, if the exact details of arrangements are looked into, in proper detail. .

My complete page from this programme https://www.dropbox.com/s/qzlgxakuprti8nn/Exeter%201978-08-25.jpg?dl=0

Now, who was it who said? Do NOT go wide!

Beware referees who exclude riders for 50/50s. There are still eight races for him to make one, or more, decisions the opposite way. Referee with balls are welcome. It would be just better if we got the occasional one who was just plain sensible.

I'm more surprised that after all those years spent so close to Speedway riders of several generations, right up to date. Philip Rising doesn't seem to understand their mindset on an issue like this even one iota.

In your, and others, view. But not so according to the FIM code.

Because the body that controls the sport, the FIM, passed a ruling that they should. A small point, I know. But sufficient reason, nonetheless.

To save your blushes. A clue. What were we all doing last Monday, just seven days ago?

It is also a little odd that the referee cannot complete the programme notation correctly either. Jarek Hampel should be FN in Heat 4 not F. This may seem over pedantic. But this is an FIM event, and these are the Official signed off results; so you would think that the ref would be able to get it right. It's not actually difficult is it?

This is one of those areas where those that wax lyrical about the halcyon days come unstuck. The old small print of admission terms and conditions said 'should it be necessary through any cause to abandon the meeting prior to the start of the sixth race, readmission tickets issued will be valid for for any one of the next three meetings' So you got nowt back even if you only saw FIVE horrendous rain affected processions completed. Truth is. On this score, if nothing else We've never had it so good !

That just does not make sense. If the FZ increases footfall by 20,000; then it will do that wherever it is placed. It cannot make H&S sense to put it where that extra footfall is MORE congested. Or is the thinking that by making it deliberately more unpleasant to attend people will be coerced into keeping away?

Fair enough. Just a couple of extra points. Not really sure that it was any more disliked or outdated with the fans when it was removed than it ever had been. I can't say that I remember an increasing clamour on the terraces for its removal in the mid eighties that was not there ten, twenty or more years before. Equally I dont think the people that left at the interval were doing so with any great ill feeling. It suited them to do so. And they returned next time and quite happily did the same again, week after week. And on top of all that the BJL matches never really got those droves to turn around and stay to the bitter end either One little anecdote from my youth in the North. Quite few of my parents friends went to The Shay every week and left at the end of heat 13 (and before the interval) so that they could go back to their local and enjoy the rest of their Saturday night as they wished. The Speedway being just part of their premier weekend night out. When the a Dukes moved to Odsal in 86 they were champing at the bit to get out of the Stadium ASAP as they now had further to travel back to the local. In 1988 the match was extended to15 heats and the powers-that-be put the interval after Heat 10 AND there was then always an extra delay before the running of the nominated Heat 15. In one move there was no more chance of a 'complete ' Saturday at Speedway AND Pub. Their answer to this dilemma was to drop Odsal and go straight down the pub! PS Just to keep this relevent. John Louis rode some fantastic second half races in 1981 and 1982. More than one of his Scratch Race final wins over Kenny Carter during this time were superb. Some second halves may have been tame, but KC did not give him an inch!

I hold no particular brief for the 'old second half' but there is no value in changing history. Some people left after the main match, that is true. Some riders had no interest in them, but this was really only a very small handful of top men who had lucrative continental commitments to dash off to. The rest saw it them just extra races in which to earn money at their job. Cash earnt there was just as useful as cash earned during the match to most first team riders But these were the excuses which were waved around by the promoters masquerading as 'reasons' in the usual bogus PR. The single reason for the change was to cut costs. Just like the introduction of EDRs was (despite protestations of 'rider development'). Most tracks cut the number of 'premium cost races from 17 or 18 down to 15 in one single move. And gave us the BJL which was done on a shoestring. But they still managed to 'sell' the fact that the league match increased from 13 to 15 races as a reason for us to be grateful. But of course like all promoters bright ideas of cost cutting, it rarely works. By reducing the number of races they rode in, most ended up just bumping up the pay rate on their remaining races. Bonkers as always I am not advocating the return of second halves, just that reinventing the facts after almost thirty years needs to be curtailed.

The joy of watching a sport that has genuine integrity. EDIT: Even though it was not a deliberate 'fail' by Zmarlik. The very fact that we believe that this is how the rules are created and abused. Is bad enough.

With fewer riders in some races now. The referee may find it easier to make just one decision correctly.

I do wish someone would sort out airfences. It is far, far too common where the rider goes under the fence . And thereby misses the entire protective performance of it.

FIM deployed the Joker in Heat One. Craig Ackroyd.

Good grief. 1 second into the SWC. And Ackroyd throws down a marker. Idiot.

Oh, Phil, you've changed your post! I thought your first was a little ... provocative. Anyway, I wonder how long it will be be before real life imitates art. A drugs arrest at a meeting would even mark a new low point for us. Even considering our recent descent into farce and ignomy. Imagine the sort of 'statement' the SCB, BSPA - or god save us - Terry Russell would produce on the matter. Or the interview NP & KT - our very own Woodward and Bernstein - would have with the felon. .

Ah I remember this being said. If only we had been given advance warning of the one-time-only nature of his sincere apology offer. That it would be available within the limited time frame of that night and would last for just the duration he was being interviewed. That once. Done and dusted, After which he was washed so clean by the appreciative applause that any further expressions of any minor level of regret over the whole affair would be excessiive. I wonder if Tony Blair has considered the wondrous cleansing effect of a South Coast Awards night? His reputation and legacy could be restored so simply. .

A funny old week really. All the events of Monday night. And then the battle for the title of 'Worst PR in Speedway'. Darcy Wards' Woeful TV Interview vs. Terry Russell's P!ss Poor Statement. For a sport that almost prides itself on the dire nature of it's public relations. It takes something to have TWO such stinkers within 24 hours. Well done, lads. What's next?

I just love the way companies feel it necessary to produce a politicians statement. It is intended to sound so reasonable and conciliatory. When it is nothing of the sort at all. So much so that it just ends up showing them to be tawdry and rather disreputable. To use the word 'liaise' to describe the scene in the Pits that we all saw live is particularly comical. And, simultaneously, deeply disingenuous. It is easy to fib about the goings on behind closed doors. A bit more difficult when it is actually being broadcast in HD. .