Nickinho

I'll edit it.

Then Pickering at 1 and Cook at number 3. Whichever.

How about this line-up for Edinburgh? 1 Pickering 2 Castagna 3 Cook 4 Hook 5 Thomson 6 Fredriksen 7 Bickley Moving Kye to 5 would pit him in against Harris and Brennan in heat 13 and around Armadale i think Kye could have the beating of them, same with Pickering. Putting Cookie at 3 would give him plenty of time to prepare for heat 15 and Paco is a lot better than Novak and Pijper around Armadale so placing him at number 2 might up his game in Heat 8 and also help out Bickley. Jacob and Lasse would be good enough to go up against Vissing and Ace in Heat 14 and it would also be a very entertaining and unpredictable race. Just suggestions and i doubt the line-up will be too surprising for either team come race day.

He will lose a lot of money doing that.

I agree but then i'm someone who doesn't like any change in speedway at all and i still miss riders wearing tassles under their arms (big shout out to the member of the Armadale team who wore them in 2022!) Now the only tassles i ever see are in Diamond Dolls but it's just not the same and i wish they would bring them back or at the very least bring back the yellow & black helmet colours. I hate yellow, it's barely indistinguishable from white.

I once had the pleasure of meeting Mary Hopkins when she attended Shielfield to witness the Bandits take on the Canterbury Crusaders on a rainswept October night in 1977 and she did indeed say that at the time. We all thought she was barmy though.

That's odd because it's nice and dry in Scotland atm. You know you're getting old when you find yourself mumbling "I remember when riders rode through sleet and snow!". Club owners will one day have to come up with some sort of solution to keeping the track dry up until tapes-up. Large sewn-together track-shaped cut tarpauling (four individual segments?) draped across the track from over the top of the air fences and weighted down on the centre green perhaps? They have to do something soon otherwise these milder summers with more rain are ultimately going to kill this sport.

That's the incident! Last night i found the old video of the meeting but couldn't figure out how to clip it and post it here. Thanks for saving me the effort

Yep. It must have been 2009 because he moved to Berwick in 2010. I've also been trying to remember who he went over and i believe it was Chris Schramm.

Pretty sure he went right over the 3rd bend fence during a double header in 2009 or 2010 (?). Only broke his ankle that time. Wasn't his fault though as the rider in front slid off right in front of him and he unintentionally used him as a ramp and just took off.

Chris Morton couldn't gate but he had an okay career

I've often wondered what level he would have reached if hadn't retired and i think his career would have been very similar to Ben Barker's, his former team-mate at Stoke as they are around the same age, the same height and they are both very aggressive and passionate racers. At the time i thought Lee would have had slightly the better career as he is more of a natural speedway rider (imo) than Ben but there wasn't much between them.

I remember reading this a few months ago or maybe it was in one of Lee's video blogs, i can't remember but he did recover quickly from it and it wasn't why he put a pause on his speedway career, i believe he reached this decision long after the crash because i remember him racing in 2009 and 2010.

Didn't you hear? Roary was shot whilst on safari in Africa. An American hunter under the misapprehension that he was extremely dangerous unloaded his blunderbuss into his backside. He will be sorely missed

Thanks

Thanks Steve. Well, that would have been this thread done and dusted if it hadn't been for Jack Thomas' unfortunate accident last week so it's now just Poole left to name a full team. They currently have a figure of 5.21 to play with so it shouldn't take too long to complete their 7. Apart from Birmingham i don't think there's a weak team in the entire league and the new season should be terrific. I also can't name a favourite but i do think that Plymouth and Oxford will be the dark horses this year and it will be interesting to see who lifts the silverware come October. Thank you to all those who have contributed to this thread, it made my life a lot easier

Lots of places are now rejecting cash but if they don't want my money anymore then so be it, i can spend it on something else.

This is how rumours start...

I've been messaging them since January but nothing has happened

I never pay for anything online so this would definitely dissuade me from going to a speedway meeting. It's just laziness on the part of speedway clubs, it's like when you're in Tesco and you discover that only one checkout is cash only. they do it so they don't have to spend time at the end of a shift counting up the coins and putting them into bags.

The Poole line-up has been edited to take into account Jack Thomas' injury

*team lists have been edited this morning to include Connor Bailey

According to Wikipedia he played in goal for Gillingham but i hope the switch to speedway suits him better

Emil Sayfutdinov signed by Ipswich EMIL HEADING TO IPSWICH - Friday, February 24, 2023 (britishspeedway.co.uk)

Very true. The last time i was in Paisley Paolo Nutini came out of a side street and kicked me in the shin and ran away laughing whilst shouting "i'm a ruddy superstar, who's going to believe you, you peasant!" He looked a bit like Paolo but it was dark and i'd had a few jars so i can't be 100% sure of what i saw or what i heard but i'm 98.77% sure that it was him.