YeOldPitGate

There seems to be a more polished version of this forum just released but only a handful of the people who post here seem to have transferred over, I have registered but haven't had an activation email through. Anyone know if this means here is on last knockings ? Phil if your about seem to think you might be involved in the running of the speedway forum , or if anyone else knows whats going on would be great to hear.

Its not a bad old life.

If TTT leaves there will only be about eight of us rattling around in here.

I would at a guess 70-80% on here are ex fans desperate to see it succeed but equally as things currently stand wouldn't be tempted back.

Very good Mike, if only mind it was thus, mind you i'm doing some investment mentoring to my youngest son and his best friend for their A levels tomorrow. The drill for his friend is turn up tomorrow at 10 am in t shirt and shorts on we will do a couple of hours on asset allocation start the bbq at midday crack open a couple of beers and you will be home by 2pm. Before they both head off I will shatter the illusion that unless you get lucky and have a great idea your looking at 40 years of graft so enjoy today.

Agreed absolutely as you said trail out after a hard days graft, try and find a parking space, assuming there's three in the family attending £75 odd to get in plus food and drink on top or flop in the armchair cold beer on one side, trusty remote in the other and the mrs cooking a nice steak sandwich in the kitchen and £15 laid out.

As someone else mentioned on the forum if you factor in the loss of the tv deal and main sponsor pulling out they were possibly 100k down on 2025 from the get go, plus it seems some promoters helped get Northampton started if Sheffield chipped in that could be another 10-25K ? (guessing). Throw in all the problems over the winter making it nigh on impossible to plan things also, I do also remember someone saying the Bates main business was also struggling so wouldn't be as much money available to bail out the Tigers. Really hope they can pull through but looking at the above there's a lot of headwinds now really hitting speedway and the possible saviors are thinner on the ground than twenty years plus ago.

Have the crowds been so much worse than 2025 as they are claiming ?

And by sounds of it you were a die hard which shows the difficulty in getting new people in. I was the same when I went me and my best mate were 18/19 at the time, we used to travel everywhere Coventry for British final, Bradford world final, Sweden world final , Ippo and Lynn every Saturday absolutely loved it. I moved away from Lynn so its now a three hour round trip and there's nothing tempting me back for the reasons we have covered on here a hundred plus times.

Yep nobody wants to see another track close, the Bates family have no doubt poured hundreds of thousands in over the years if they step down will anyone be willing to take it on ? unlikely I would think.

Spot on and I'm guessing probably still earns 80-100k out of the sport in those six months.

Yep he is the blue print for any UK rider that realises they won't reach the gp aside from needing to work on his presentation skills when turning up for a meeting he has played the game like a finely tuned fiddle in both leagues in the UK.

Or if he could really be bothered with the prep could he put a point to point and a half on his average as I have said previously if a rider has no lofty ambitions and just wants to earn a good living he is the blue print even allowing for just slinging the gear in the van untouched from the last meeting.

So the rumours of turning up with dirty bikes and boots are true the old flannel not up to muster ?

Problem is where will they get the riders from for that, personally think best we can hope for is 8 and 8 top league ideally have one top liner each and the bottom four riders in the top league double up in the second division so its financially viable for them. Once home and away which would avoid seeing same teams week in week out and hopefully reduce promoters losses as fewer meetings to underwrite. Would love to see one big league but given they are struggling to get through fixtures in a six team top league can see how they would ever cope with 15-16 teams and as mentioned guessing they would need 30-50 extra riders from somewhere.

Dreadful state of affairs

I remember thinking the same when Bill Barker was running Lynn and trying to balance the books by wandering round at half time selling raffle tickets. I once said "give everyone who comes through the gate a questionnaire to fill in relating to what they like/don't like about the current speedway set up and give them a spare to give to someone who used to attend but no longer does). Nothing ever happened and Bill soldiered on with the raffle tickets but as Mike has said there's going to come a crunch soon when the over 40 year old double uppers retire and we are nearly out of people who will step in and take over underwriting the annual track losses.

To get better its going to require someone coming in who's willing to lose 100k per annum to put a far better team together or get some really good sponsors in to underwrite the 100k. It looks like there's definately a core fan base to build on but to get anywhere they would need to replace Klindt with Anders Thompson, Zagar with Jepsen Jensen and Batch with Beau Bailey or similar, all of which would probably require 12-20k a meeting to underwrite granted that would be part netted off by the existing three leaving.

I think though with at least three of the Northampton team if they pop out in front they are fine but if they are behind come the exit on second bend lap one you can fill your program in. Granted he's not the best manager but he has been handed the worst team this year and ditto 2026, in both years it doesn't help there's near zero replacement options so the riders in question can coast along knowing they are bullet proof.

The lad should have a big career ahead of him if he stays level headed, Cairns, Rushton, Harrison and Scott should be the core England world team cup squad in years ahead sadly as we are so far behind Poland these days talented as those four UK lads are we probably still won't be able to lay a glove on the young poles who are there to meet them when the time comes.

Remember when they used to wheel Pete out for the tv interviews , he was a brilliant manager but a terrible advert for the sport in front of the cameras permanent grimace and you could tell he wanted to be anywhere else but giving an interview.

To be fair he has had some dire teams but I take your point.

Spot on the mentality is certainly in second division if i get out first I should be able to hold on if not settle for what you can get and don't take a risk, Sedgeman is another example and to be fair even if it drives us crackers you can't really blame them for trying to avoid a bad injury if they are at the tail end of their career.

Agreed when I used to go Sky was just starting out so most had only 3-4 tv channels, no streaming platforms, no online gaming, no dating sites, no multi plex cinemas etc tugging on the disposable income. The quality of the teams was stronger than now all be it the general lack of promotion was on par but due to lack of alternatives promoters mostly got away with it. As I've said many a time its not just speedway that's been dying a slow death last 30 years, nightclubs are virtually gone when I think to the one's I went to late 90's early noughties they were heaving with thousands inside if you had of said to me then in 25 years 90% of these will be gone I would have laughed at you. It just seems the public have no interest in size in Speedway, Nightclubs and pubs these days unless the pub is well run but even then I get the impression most pubs run at a loss and like speedway are bailed out by other businesses. It's getting hard to paper over the cracks 2-3 riders missing every meeting due to either injuries or riding elsewhere, one meeting a month then 3-4 in a fortnight, lack of riders now wiling to ride in the UK making the doubling up situation worse. Teams closing meaning seeing the same teams on repeat so people pick and choose meetings and as others have said you have streaming given a lot of racing is gate and go why not sit in your armchair with a beer at home no agg of travelling out and looking for a parking spot and buying over priced burgers and flat pints.

Does it seem crowds have dropped more this years than usual ? it always seemed to be death by a thousand cuts where everything (quality of product, price to get in, crowds etc) dropped slightly year on year but from what some on here are saying it seems maybe a 10-20% drop in crowds against 2025 ? It always used to be when a club was in trouble 2-3 semi wealthy businessmen were waiting in the wings to takeover they then generally lost 50-100k per season for 2-3 years chucked the towel in then rinse and repeat with someone new but the availability of benefactors ready to underwrite losses also seems to have nearly dried up to.