TigerIain

Smith has been around a while but has often been the victim of the numbers game, so maybe not as experienced as done think. Partly as he has tracks he rides well and others he really doesn't. In this line up he could be at reserve all year. If he carries on his end of '25 season form he should be fine.

My point is that you can't accept the reality that Cami Brown was the manager when Tigers won the Playoffs in 2023. You have this weird obsession for blaming him for everything that goes wrong, and crediting anyone else for things that go right for the Tigers. Then you claim everyone else is obsessed by him.

Won't be Perry, his Facebook update tonight states that he had not signed for anyone in the Championship for next season

Max Perry stated on his Facebook tonight that he is not signed up for any Championship club for 2026

I also think on a personal level he would have been disappointed with his final average and not being able to hold onto the number 5 race jacket last year.

There was some talk at the start of last season that Craig Cook had convinced Wood to change his bike frames and that had helped his riding but it didn't seem to translate into points. From what I seen he seemed to fall off a bit too often last year. Good gater, which always helps at reserve level and he does have a years experience, so could improve slightly. Personally I'm not a fan of his (especially after seeing him attack Stene Pijper after losing to him in a send half race at Ashfield). I would have went for the more experienced Jack Smith. With 2 solid second strings he would have stayed at reserve all year and could have ended the year on a 4-5 point average.

"Oxford Cheetahs team for 2026 is complete with the double signing of 𝗗𝗮𝗿𝗿𝘆𝗹 𝗥𝗶𝘁𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 and 𝗗𝗮𝘆𝗹𝗲 Wood" Think this team will be in contention for trophies, albeit a little bit weak at reserve, yet so were Glasgow last year and they finished top of the table. Both reserves have Championship experience from 2025, but it needs one of them at least to kick on and up their scoring.

No, but if Oxford haven't signed him, and we'll find out tomorrow who their reserve are, then it essentially confirms that he is riding for Poole before Poole announce it. I expect Rushen to be riding for Poole next year

@Paddy The Rebel You have Plymouth in as the Devils rather than the Gladiators. Either way, they've just announced Daniel Klima returning, presumably on 4.00 Poole have just announced Zach Cook on 7.34

Hard to be exact because of so many lower order Premiership team changes, but I recon that there are about 17 currently announced in the Championship next year that were not doubling up in the Premiership last year. No 2026 Premiership signings announced yet, but last year there were about 23 riders that rode Premiership without riding Championship.

Makes sense to announce Rushen tonight. Oxford announce their reserves tomorrow, and are realistically the only other team that might have signed Rushen. So if you announce Cook, leaving a 2 point hole and Oxford don't announce Rushen the it all but confirms your final rider. Cook still has that little bit of 'has he changed his mind about missing the Championship next year' mystery if they announce him last.

Realistically, nope. Major surprise if it wasn't them. But for the sake of debate...if it's not Cook, there are not many around on that average, meaning that Pirates either go a couple of points under the limit with Rushen or sign a 5ish pointer and a 4ish pointer instead. If they have Cook but not Rushen then maybe Daryl Ritchings gets another shot at 7? He did better than expected last year.

Possibly they don't pay more per point or per mile than other clubs. But have extras like free accommodation, free workshop use and help finding sponsorship. So the cash from the promotion is the same as others, as they claim, but the overall package they organise is better. They also don't hang about, I heard more than 6 months ago that Rushen had agreed to ride for Poole in 2026. I'm not sure how long Wessex Marine have sponsored Rushen but that is likely to play a part in where he ends up given that they also sponsor the Pirates.

Was that not the winter where KL promoter Buster Chapman was buying the Witches, and it was Buster not Chris Louis moving them to the Premiership (or whatever it was called that year)? The sale didn't happen and Louis remained promoter but did change leagues, purely because it was too late to pull out. Yes Chris Louis then put a lot of work in to stay in his local league. But without Buster Chapman forcing Ipswich to change leagues then it might never have happened, and almost certainly wouldn't have happened in the year that it did.