RobMcCaffery

Good, he came across as likeable, just a victim of the mentality that speedway is just another bike sport and followed by the same public.

When you have such huge gaps in the fixtures it makes sense to run meetings profitably in good weather than struggle through in front of a pitiful crowd and lose a packet. Supporters have seen too many 10 heat scrambles or call-offs once they've paid their money and avoid meetings when the weather is doubtful. Decades of neglecting customers and "we've not had a drop of rain all day" messages are now coming home to roost.

It's been raining a lot lately......

Thanks. The one who would introduce himself as "Hello, it's Jack here", as if we all knew him, presumably from his regular motorcycle work, presuming that all speedway fans were avid watchers of the other biker disciplines. I'm sure he's a lovely chap and knows his stuff, sadly not speedway.

I'm pretty sure that's what I said Thank you for the confirmation. It's not expected to appear on Freeview due to space/cost considerations and they are reported to be still negotiating with VM over cable carriage.

Freesports send out their schedule - the various services list it on their epg. Freesports then change it and eventually the epgs are changed to match, some quicker than others, clearly.

It's unlikely to be on Freeview due to space/cost considerations. Hopefully it'll be on Virgin Media as well as Sky when it does launch. I understand talks are continuing. It seems the hold up has been about VM wanting to carry Premier and Freesports as part of their top package without extra charge with Premier holding out for a separate monthly fee. Effectively Freesports and the customers are caught in the crossfire.

The last live coverage we saw in the UK was Eurosport's efforts using that road racing commentator who kept telling us how he used to watch speedway at Belle Vue in the seventies...

I have done what I should have done earlier in the conversation - look on You Tube. There I found the 2018 Dorna/FIM coverage! Age is clearly claiming me. So, you can see for yourself. This is the Astana round. It's all on the tvfim channel. At least anyone who wants to catch up can.

Dorna always produced TV packages of all rounds on behalf of the FIM, with them being shown in the UK on minority motorsport channels. They've not been shown over here for a couple of years but I know the coverage was still being shown in dark corners of the internet on a pay per view basis. I raised the matter with the FIM Press Office who came up with a list of online outlets, most of which weren't available in the UK (geoblocking) or were subscription only. I just left them to get on with it. With the absolute Russian domination it wasn't worth pushing the point too far. My comment was based on that same coverage still being recorded, just that it's not making it to the UK. Has it made it onto TV in Finland? The hope was that if the Longtrack could find its way into a pretty public platform then if the Dorna/FIM programmes are still being made maybe they might also be shown.

Digiguide report a match every Sunday on Freesports through April, covering all of the first four rounds. Timings are: 8th April Round 1 3.30pm - live 15th April Round 2 10.15 pm - delayed 22nd April Round 3 6.00 pm - presumably the second match live 29th April Round 4 6.00 pm - as above There are several repeat showings as well.

Often later than 31st October. It was as late as November 10th one season in the 70s, and a challenge at that if I remember right. In those days any track running fewer than 26 meetings a year was seen as being in trouble with 30+ being commonplace and expected. But then meetings made profits, even those open events that the modern day 'fan' sneers at.

I think you'll find they need the sales to grasstrack and overseas supporters. Small price to pay for the survival of a magazine that, let's be honest, was dumped by a major publisher (IPC) and had to be rescued by the brave efforts and financial risk of its own editorial staff. With the sport collapsing in Britain they needed to do anything to prop sales up.

Perhaps on their website? http://www.speedwaystar.net/ Oh yes!

I think we can take this as confirmation of Sunday

He's a member of it! If he really believes that he really has a lot to learn about the sport. Sorry, a 300 mile round trip for a chat with a manager isn't really that tempting.

The programme before is recorded so there's scope to juggle programming if the earlier live sport over-runs.

A small price to pay for the chance to earn the Polish riches. You tend to find that complaints in speedway reduce the more money gets paid out/

That really is excellent news. Hopefully a similar deal can be resurrected for ice racing one day.

Well, we have had 'new builds' at Scunthorpe, Somerset and Leicester in the relatively recent past so sometimes the efforts can pay off, but yes I have seen for myself what goes into these searches. I hope you can find find a way to get Hull back, hopefully without being at the mercy of rugby league next time.

Give a man power........

Gniezno had two of their best riders at reserve against Leszno and used a non-standard formula without a reserves race. Last week one team used 8 riders in a match. These really are just practice sessions which is why I'm very surprised TVP televised the Gniezno meeting.

Hopefully we did inspire a few and have helped or may help future successes in resurrecting tracks. I was so proud to be involved in a meeting organised by Steve Ribbons at Iwade which included Scunthorpe and Weymouth, well before their new tracks were built and I suspect it was their first appearances since Ashby Ville and the Wessex Stadium were lost. Since then I think we've seen some practical attempts to revive teams with a professional plan to find a new track while some have seemed more idealistic than practical and a few seeming just like a 'cash-in'. After Rye House I had a year with Boston at King's Lynn and I know how hard Stephen Lambert and Malcolm Vasey fought to find a new track in Boston but every obstacle you could imagine was put in their way. Eventually you just got the feeling the town was determined that the sport wasn't going to return. Then there was one south coast venture where the promises that a new site was being searched for came across as rather empty. Even if a project doesn't end in success as at Rye House it can be moving to at least see a team with your track's name on revived. It sadly didn't work with Hackney and I note some similar revival junior league teams like Halifax have sadly fallen by the wayside this year. If 1999 had been a 'one-off' and Rye House not reopened the following year at least I had one more, highly enjoyable season despite my serious ill-health which I think I managed to hide from the public at least that year. We had to give it a go and it was an emotional day when we made our comeback at Eastbourne. It seems many Coventry fans are determined to boycott the Bees' revival at Leicester. One day they'll realise their mistake in missing what may be one final year to enjoy watching a team called Coventry Bees. Despite the events of 2000 that battle to get the Rockets back in 1999 will always be precious, especially in view of the ridiculous obstacles put in our way and the fans who refused to get involved. Thankfully enough felt differently and I was able to play a small part. Having lost Rayleigh for good, then Rye House for six years, even with my distance (in more ways than one) from the club since '99 I am wary of any threats to the stadium and team and still care deeply that they both survive, even if our 70 year old colours didn't..... Those weren't Len Silver's colours, they went right back to the birth of the Rockets at their original home at Rayleigh in 1948. Now, if anyone fancies running a meeting involving Rayleigh Rockets wearing a white rocket on blue and gold halves let me know

Thanks. Glad to hear they've got their act together.

That wasn't the full Leszno team. They were minus Piotr Pawlicki and Damian Balinski and had to use a relative novice to cover for reserve Bartosz Smektala riding in the top 5. Also, it WAS just a practice session.