HenryW

The final Wembley track record is actually 66.8 seconds which was set by Erik Gundersen in heat 6 of the 1981 final.

Because of Marc Marquez.

So for the examples that you gave, these riders would now have to wait a further 7 months to make their full World Championship debut as they would have contested the Grand Prix Challenge at the end of the year rather than the World Final. Not exactly a mammoth wait in the grand scheme of things. Having said that, no-one has managed to get to the top end of the GP challenge quite so quickly after the start of their career so either there are no riders coming through that are of the calibre of Louis and Lee or the rest of the riders are of a higher standard these days and it isn't so easy to break through to the top level.

Is that really true? Does this happen in many other sports? I am genuinely interested to know of what other sports have a qualification system in the same year as the World Champion is decided as none of the sports that I follow do this. I am honestly not sure that the qualification being done the year before makes all that much difference but I do agree that only 15 permanent riders in the series is too few. During the few years where 22 permanent riders were included in the series it seemed to be better to me. The format of the actual meetings might not have been ideal but the extra 7 places being available made a big difference, not to mention the extra wildcard being available each round.

I certainly didn't say that. However, any rider who requires a work permit to race in this Country has to prove they have a fairly high level of competence by establishing themselves either in their domestic competitions or in other nations before they are allowed a work permit. Quite simply, that is what the Government demand of all sportspeople requiring work permits for this Nation. The standard that was agreed with the Government several years ago equated to a 7 point average in the Premier League and that actually seems fairly generous given the wording of the law. All that is happening just now is that the Government are enforcing this after a few years where the speedway authorities were allowing riders in on lower averages without the explicit approval of the Government to do this.

Maybe a better question would be why a rider "who has never rode in this country or abroad" would be eligible for a work permit in the first place? The requirements for a tier 2 sportsperson visa state that you must be "...an elite sportsperson or qualified coach recognised by your sport’s governing body as internationally established at the highest level". A 7 point average in the 2nd division doesn't seem like an excessive ask for a rider established at the highest level and that appears to be what the UK Government are now properly enforcing.

And important to note how long it took the FIM to rule on former World Champion James Stewart. Failed test in April, decision made in December...Things move slowly in the FIM. It isn't the case that the fim are just slow with speedway decisions.

It isn't just them that have had this problem, though. Alex Loktaev has had similar problems when it comes to racing in the UK in recent years.

Tarnow according to this link: http://www.sportowefakty.pl/zuzel/wydarzenie/25356

I'm not sure that it does say anything about the way the FIM views speedway. Admittedly I can't think of any case where any other top line motorsports competitor was stupid enough to fail a breath test, so there isn't a direct comparison. However, as has been mentioned before, it falls under the FIM anti-doping regulations and I can think of a couple of recent examples of how slowly things move with other cases. Three time World Supercross champion James Stewart failed a drugs test on the 12th of April this year. He was provisionally suspended on the 20th of June. As far as I am aware he is still awaiting his hearing. In 2012 Anthony West failed a drugs test at the French MotoGP round on the 20th of May. The FIM hearing for that case didn't happen until over 5 months later, and the final penalty (after an appeal by WADA against the leniency of the initial ban) wasn't known for over a year. So it's not just speedway, the FIM don't tend to move too swiftly regardless of the sport involved

Seriously? Are you still dragging out the "burger" incident? How many times do you need to be told to go back and think about that incident again? That had no benefit to the Monarchs and I am still confused about how anyone thinks it did.

The Individual U21 title saw 4 years in a row without a Polish or Danish winner between 2007 and 2010...The team title went outside of those 2 Nations in 2011.... I don't recall any massive rise in interest in any of those years, so let's not blame the Polish and Danish domination, let's just tell it like it is... No-one really cares that much about the U21 titles...

Could you actually see anything on track where you were sat on your little chair with your feet up? I could believe that you might have fallen asleep whilst only seeing the back of the air fence It's maybe also worth pointing out that wearing a blue and yellow hat to the Dale when Berwick are visiting can see you counted as a Monarch from a distance and I am sure you don't want that

Methylhexanamine seems to be the drug being quoted in some reports.

I guess Chris Harris will probably get his chance now as surely Patryk Dudek won't be competing after his drug test failure has been confirmed.

Methylhexanamine is the substance that had been claimed to have been found in Dudek's first sample by the Polish press. The last major FIM competitor to be caught with this was Australian Anthony West. The FIM gave him a 1 month ban which the world anti doping agency then appealed and it was increased to 18 months, so it's clearly something that the WADA care about greatly.

To be fair, in his first meeting over here he scored 10 points in the U21 qualifier at Leicester defeating the likes of Manzares, Fricke and Krcmar in races which was a decent effort.

Why do you say this? Do you think he has some other career that he would be itching to move into if his speedway one was put on hold for a year? Obviously Havvy was banned for a year for his drugs offence and he did sit and count the days until he could race again, then went off and won the World Title. There is absolutely no reason why Darcy couldn't do the same IF he does receive a ban.

Erm...Surely the part of the regulations that you are quoting is irrelevant. That refers to refusing to submit a sample or tampering with doping control. Having said that, the standard ban for a first offence IS 2 years. However, how does regulation 10.4 fit in with failing an alcohol test? There is no question of him trying to enhance his performance with alcohol and I am sure he can explain how it entered his system 10.4 Elimination or Reduction of the Period of Ineligibility for Specified Substances under Specific Circumstances Where a Rider or other Person can establish how a Specified Substance entered his or her body or came into his or her possession and that such Specified Substance was not intended to enhance the Riders sport performance or mask the use of a performance-enhancing substance, the period of Ineligibility found in Article 10.2 shall be replaced with the following: First violation: At a minimum, a reprimand and no period of Ineligibility from future events (competitions), and at a maximum, two (2) years of Ineligibility.

Those were surely pics after the rain where they were trying to lay a new track, no? Pretty sure I saw some clips on youtube a month or two ago when the Latvian youngsters were practising on the track in Riga, so there must have been something for them to practice on back then

Am I mistaken or has this stadium in Riga previously hosted speedway? I know that the track had to be laid afresh as it had been concreted over a while ago, but I thought that it had hosted speedway back 10 or 15 years ago. If it has then it really isn't THAT different from Western Springs.

Yeah, I was just going to say this. The Poles announced their final 4 two weeks ago, so it would be very disappointing if this is being raised as an issue now.

Poland will use Hampel, Kasprzak, Protasiewicz and Kolodziej.

You have a strange definition of "luck". They lost their 2nd best rider to injury and, with the way things went last night, they would have had a really good chance of going straight to the final if Ryan had been fit.

Ermm...USA would have used Ryan Fisher if he hadn't been injured.