Chris116

One rider, Vic Duggen, did not have his initials for a good reason. He just had Vic on his bib.

How can you say a track is in the middle of nowhere when it is a five minute walk from a railway station that has an hourly or better service to and from London?

At least they will finish in the top six in the league!

I did not think it was one or two people who had made the decision to not follow through on what was announced as a five year plan. Whether it is the BSPL or the Championship league who got rid of the idea does not matter. What is certain is that once again speedway has introduced a five year plan and then voted against it within twelve months. If "rising stars" were such a good idea twelve months ago that they were voted in why change their minds without giving the idea a fair trial? How does having riders sitting in the pits and not racing as number eights help them progress?

The plan at the start of last season was to have two rising stars this season. That has been watered down to having a number eight who could never actually get to race. How is not having them race a way of helping "rising stars"? BSPL are saying they want to help rising stars but dropped them from the Championship and halved them in the Premiership and now want to sideline six riders as number eights. What am I missing or have those in charge got it totally wrong, not for the first time.

They would need changes on days two and three. Then on day four a new ten day plan would be announced!

I think this meeting just reinforces my view that Rider Replacement should not be allowed if there is not a number 8 at the track ready to race if required.

While what you say is correct, you are being rather devious as EVERY fixture for ALL tracks is morked "provisional" from the start of September on the Spedeworth fixture list. Stop trying to make things worse on every subject you comment on, it is becoming a bore.

The Connor Coles situation must be very close to being restraint of trade in legal terms. I hope the whole sorry mess can be sorted before a rider takes the BSPL to court as I think it could land up with the BSPL being made to look even worse than they already do.

That is already more than the entire Premiership put together!

I hope I am the not only fan who has noticed that only one promoter has had any input to this thread! I also noted that the promotion concerned left the BSPL after being treated like dirt by the powers that be in the run up to this season. Well done to Barry Bishop and the Warriors promotion for all the hard work they do to put on entertainment that speedway fans can enjoy. From all the reports I have seen the first two meetings have been a success from the point of view of entertainment value and good crowds which is very good news. All I now need them to sort out is South Western Railway and Wightlink so they run the late boat from Ryde and the late train from Portsmouth so I can enjoy the racing and get home to Wimbledon after the meeting. Sadly the local council allowed a football stadium to be built on the Speedway and Stock Car track in Plough Lane that I enjoyed both sports from August 1957 (6th October 1962 in the case of stox) until the last car meeting on 26th March 2017. After what happened at Wimbledon I know one firm I would never buy a flat or house from.

That means you visited the site of the old stadium which has a special place in my heart as it was the first track I ever commentated on Stock Cars.

Probably not but he did go to Crewe and along with all the other Hot Rod drivers regretted goi g as their car were shaken to bits by the ploughed field of a track. Wisbech was a far from smooth concrete surface but nowhere near as rough as Crewe.

Former Speedway rider and multi Hot Rod World Champion, Barry Lee, once described Wisbech as the "ar5e end of the universe" and that was before the stadium was knocked down and a supermarket built on the site.

Great to hear that the first meeting went well. Now I just hope that Wightlink/SWR play ball and reinstate the late evening boat and train services to enable me to enjoy the racing and get home afterwards. Good luck to all involved with the Warriors.

In that case the comments about it being 36 hours before have misled me. As I said 24 hours seems to be reasonable to me.

In my view the question that needs answering is "if the meeting had not been called off was the track in raceable condition at what would have been the start time?" If the answer is yes then the promotion got it wrong but if the answer is no then they were right. If the track was fit for racing at the planned start time then how much more rain could it have taken? If the answer to that is "very little" then I think the promotion were being sensible. Personally I think that they should have waited until 24 hours before planned start time but I am not the one with the purse strings and do not know what the early postponement saved the promotion compared to waiting until around 24 hours before the meeting.

I have never ridden a speedway bike but I used to ride a bike on the road (Jawa CZ 250cc Twin and then Honda 400cc Dream). Driving rain was never a problem with visibility but a fine mist could make things very difficult. In fact the only things I came across that was worse was driving snow, a low sun ahead of you and the occasional idiot who put their main beam back on about 30 yards before they passed you in the opposite direction. I say this remembering that I had a screen in front of me, tarmac rather than shale under my wheels and brakes to slow down and stop with. If most of the riders at a meeting say they can't see properly then I would never argue with them.

I am very pleased that a new fixture list has been released and racing will be taking place at Smallbrook Stadium but sad to see that it has not been possible to keep the sidecars in the fixture list. Now I have to hope that Wightlink and South Western Railway reinstate the late evening services so that it is possible for me to get home to Wimbledon after the racing.

Totally agree with the fact that midweek meetings were never a problem for me when I was at school. We lived near Southfields District line station and went to Wimbledon every Monday and West Ham on occasional Tuesdays (by underground train and then bus from Plaistow to the stadium). I used to sleep on the train with no problems. I have therefore never understood the modern families who don't go out midweek due to the kids being at school the next day.

I am finding it very hard to keep my interest as SWR have stopped running the late train that enabled me to get back to Wimbledon from Poole meetings and Wightlink have cancelled the late ferry that enabled me to get home from Warriors meetings. IOW is also affected by SWR not running the late train and the BSPL stitching them up. The fact that Wightlink are one of the Warriors sponsors just puts the icing on the cake!

Because the alternative is a five team league! Try thinking about the whole sport instead of following the BSPL normal policy of only thinking about the track they run / you support.

The figure 8 track is only used by Bangers. The Stock Cars only use the oval track.

I have never been to Mendips Raceway but understand that that the bends of the current track are tight and also the track is on the side of a hill. Sadly I do not think it would be possible to have a speedway track either on or inside the current track. EDIT:- I have just had a look at some photos from Mendips Raceway and maybe the bends are not too tight for an inside track but the centre green area appears to be raised which means a lot of earth moving would be needed.

While it is possible to lay shale on top of a tarmac track as has been done at Northampton, it has to be remembered that the South Western based F2 Stock Car drivers do not like shale and would not be happy to have one of their tracks changed to shale.