Steve Shovlar

Todays national press coverage is the best it has ever been since the 70's. All the nationals carry the story, some with pics. Only the Guardian flopped, doing a couple of paragraphs. The rest did us proud. If any other rider ( other than Howe or Nicholls had won it, I doubt very much if any space would have been given over at all. Trouble there was a F1 GP on yesterday and they have such a clout with the media, especially so at the mo with Hamilton doing so well. They are so proffessional they send out a few freebies to the press association and get massive coverage, even if the race is dreadful procession. Speedway can never compete with that.

Whats his email?

Not the slightest mention on the BBC breakfast sports report this morning. What a suprise.

Telegraphs report. Not bad. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtm...2/smspee102.xml The Express report. "It was bedlam, it was brilliant." http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/12011/...in+a+Millennium Guardian gives us two poxy paragraphs. http://sport.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2116266,00.html The Sun http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,3-2007300279,00.html Poole Echo. TRick sends his congrats. http://www.thisisdorset.net/display.var.1511181.0..php Crumps delight for Harris. http://www.thisisdorset.net/display.var.1511182.0..php

Don't know if anyone else noticed this last night but when harris won the final, a guy with a Cornish flag ran forward on the bottom tier waiving it frantically and leaping about in joy, hoping to catch Harris eye and give him the flag. he was pounced on by the usual over zealous stewards, who had had bugger all to do all night, and marched out, even though the guy was no where near the track and just emational with joy. You could see him saying to the steward he would go bak to his seat, but the jobsworth was having none of it and marched the guy out, arm in half nelson. Pathetic.

Well it certainly looks like some of the nationals are reporting Bombers win last night in tomorrows papers. Here's a great report from the Daily Mail, a paper which never gives the sport coverage! http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/arti...in_page_id=1781

Difference is any people killed by pirates are long dead! But there are many children out there today who lost their whole families to "Bomber" Harris.

http://www.theargus.co.uk/sport/argusgener...ms_gp_track.php

In these times of political corretness, is it time for Chris Harris to drop his nickname? The final GP this year is in Germany, and I am sure many Germans still have memories of the tactics used by Bomber Harris in the second world war. Carpet bombing of cities, causing fire storms and the deaths of thousands of women and children. Whilst in this country Bomber Harris is a popular wartime figure, using the same strategy oday would surely see him up for war crimes. Imagine if there was a German rider called Herman "SS" Himmler?

Sunday papers go to print much earlier than dailies. They would have been printed way before Harris crossed the line in the final. Wait for tomorrow buut don't hold your breath on seeing many coloum inches. England are playing cricket, Wimbledon is still on and boring F1 has Hamilton scoring a few points. Might be lucky and see a few paragraphs. Anything more than that would be a bonus.

I have been to all 7 Cardiff GPs and last nights was the best. Funny how the organisers fill the back straight top tier before the home straight top tier. I was up on the top tier last night and the viewing is good but too far away from the action. Perhaps flog thos seats for a tenner, or better still, run some comps in the nationals where they say ten pairs of tickets are available to win, when really everyone who enters and gets the question right ( who won the 2007 GP etc) gets a pair of tickets for the upper tier.

Well now I have been fed and watered after a short nights sleep I will give my thoughts. First of all what a nightmare leaving the stadium in a cloud burst. Got absolutely soaked walking the 20 mnutes back to the car. We parked in the long thin car park as you come into Cardiff along the side of the road, and it took over an hour to get out the bloody carpark!! (Not that we wer too bothered!) Got in at 2.20 am, a good hour later than usual. Still damp, knackered byt buzzing (especially the poor old ears! ) During the day the atmosphere was flatter than usual because of the rotten weather, and the pubs seemed much quieter. Very easy to get served and it boded for a smaller crowd in the stadium. Wrong! On entering the stadium at 5 pm we enjoyed the youngsters having a ride. Must have been great for them. The 8 lads only had one ride each but here I think was a missed opportunity. Rather than suffer Chas and Dave, and the probably ten grand it cost to have them there, why not have had the first and second placed riders from the two heats have a race in front of the 50,000 during the interval, rather than race in front of the few tousand at 5.20 pm? Would THAT have been somethig special for the yongsters and they would probably have been on Sky TV as well. Would have given them a massive taste. Perhaps that could be considered in the future? Onto the meeting itself and the first few heats were a bit boring, but about heat 5-6 it started to get better and better, until the briliant finale which brought the whole house down. Best British GP by the proverbial mile, best final, best winner. Stand up Chris Harris. Absolutely marvellous performance and I never thought he had it in him to do it. Before the final I said that if he could make the rostrum it would be a huge filip on his behalf, but to do what he did was just stunning. Still wiping the egg off my face after stating he was out of his depth before the GP series started. And happy to do so. His gating is just about as atrocious as it can get, which is a shame as it will cost him at times. But last night was his night and he fully deserved all the plaudits coming his way. Well done Chris Harris. Brilliant.

Well when we found our seats they were bad. Middle of the 3rd/4th bend, upper tier, 10 rows back. Too far from the track. So we waited for the meeting to start, saw where there were some good emptey seats and moved. Ended up on the front row of the second tier, in comfortable padded seats, directly opposite the starting gate! Very nice and probably very expensive!

Agree with you for once TNT. The attendance was well up on last year. The only empty seats were third tier home sraight and on the 3rd/4th bend middle section. The whole of the back straight was full as well as the first and second tiers. We all estimated 48-50,000. Certainly more than 41,000. If this continues, two years from now it will be a sellout 60,000, meaning ordering early to get our tickets and the arrival of the dreaded tout.

Biggest crowd ever at Cardiff tonight. Certainly well up again on last year. Suprised considering the dreadful weather we had.

PM seb the snail. he has a couple spare. Or check the poole forum. Someone has a spare one on there they need to get rid of.

You could always ring the coach organiser and see if anyone has dropped out.

Don't want to ruin my beautiful golden locks.

Can't believe you are not going Rabs. I have maged to get a lift rather than drive. Being picked up by Shaleshifter around 9.30 am, with 4 Poles, one of which came over in the back of Jugus' van. The other is a friend of KK. They all speak good english so should get a few good stories! Going to try and drink a bit less than last year, when I got pretty wrecked and abusive when Crump won the replay. Lemonade until 4 pm!

The centre of Cardiff and outside when queuing up to get in?

I hope they allow umbrellas in the stadium, otherwise about 20,000 people are going to be well P'd off.

I reember the first cardiff GP and there were only a handful of Poles there. Now that there are so many of them over here is will be interesting to see just how many turn up tomorrow.

With the weather going to be dire, I have decided to head into the stadium when it first opens to watch the youngsters race. It's OK when the weather is fine, but being couped up in a packed out pub gets pretty boring.

Can't find much news on how many tickets have been sold for tomorrow, I have a feeling the attendance will be down on the last few years, especially with poor weather forecast. Thoughts?

Big well done to Eddie and Bridger, two Brits through. Also well done to Noddy Holder, Poole in waiting!