Tigerblade

Yes, of course I only have the history books to go on from before that, but I think it is fair to say that crash practically finished Ashby as a force. It was entirely down to track conditions, it was late on in the meeting and the track was akin to Gothenburg a couple of weeks previous. The kind of meeting that would never start nowadays.

I hated my first meeting too, believe it or not! September 16th 1976, Bass-Charrington (local brewery) Open meeting, hated the smell and the flying shale, spent most of the evening in the T shirt printing hut. My Dad had known this bloke from our village for a couple of years, but only knew he was called Doug, he and my Mum went to the pits to see which ones Doug Wyer and Reg Wilson were.... Yes, you've guessed it..... Anyhow, they liked it and I went again on September 15th 1977 to the Gauloises Pairs semi final which featured Sheffield, Wolverhampton, Belle Vue, King's Lynn, Swindon, Bristol and Exeter. This was the meeting Phil Crump broke his femur, Martin Ashby and Ivan Mauger also suffered injuries. Bearing in mind what was to happen in future years, not only was Michael Lee present, he scored an immaculate 18 point maximum! Next Thursday is also the 15th September, and would you credit it, our home meeting is on Wednesday.....

Macca, The trams do go through Hillsborough parallel to Penistone Road, about 5 minutes walk to Owlerton, if you have booked your digs in Sheffield centre you need one with destination either Malin Bridge (blue) or Middlewood (yellow) and get off at the Hillsborough stop (outside the Rawson Spring pub) then go down Bradfield Road and Owlerton Green.

Reg Wilson and Gary Guglielmi at Owlerton in late 1982... Reg tries to go under GG on the 3rd bend, both of them go flying through the fence and land on the greyhound track, Gary ended up with 2 bikes and Reg on top of him, think he ended up with a broken arm, but how it wasn't anything much more serious, I still don't know to this day. Hugh Skidmore (I think) a couple of years back, who flew over the air fence and landed on the dog track, I'd never seen that in all my years of going, and then later in the season someone else did it and unfortunately ended up with a broken femur. I know I am stating the obvious but the second guy hit the ground slighly differently to Hugh.

Now having the hindsight of his Leicester (not his World Final!) performances a season later, they probably dodged a bullet with Rembas!

Jimmy Mac was riding for Wolverhampton in 1977, but the rest certainly were the nucleus of the Vikings, Graham Drury finished as No. 1 IIRC. Looking back now, it does all seem a total farce, but then again there were a lot more teams, hence lesser availability.

Who said anything about not liking him? For my part, I simply said he generally wasn't as good at Sheffield as Jason Garrity. When Ricky was riding for Sheffield, I generally defended the bloke when others were moaning about him! I think you're being a bit unfair, last year every member of the side suffered injury lay offs at some point, some simultaneously. The promotion couldn't really do a lot about that.

Not at Sheffield, he isn't.

Bumping this one up - the Kindle edition is amongst 250 books in the Kindle spring sale, so will be 99p for a few weeks. Even though speedway only features briefly, it's a great book for those who like a bit of post war social history http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pie-Mash-Prefabs-1950s-Childhood-ebook/dp/B00U58TZD0?ie=UTF8&keywords=pie%20n%20mash%20n%20prefabs&qid=1458816633&ref_=sr_1_1_twi_kin_2&sr=8-1

Ann Collins raced against Pauline Bastable (sister of Steve), not sure where or when, but it was the American lady racer Bobbi Hunter who raced against Ove's daughter at Wembley.

Most people seem to be discussing his second spell with Newcastle, he was also there 1978 - 1981, starting as a 16 year old. Would have loved him to have stayed at Sheffield longer, but circumstances at the time dictated otherwise.

Thank you so much for that, GC. I did remember that Reg's only defeat was to Ian Cartwright in his first race after the interval, but I had completely forgotten about him and Jimmy Mac being level on points and meeting in the last heat!

I was at this meeting - don't have programme details to hand, but I can 100% state that Chris Morton did NOT ride in it as he had pleurisy, and I had to ask my parents what it was! I enjoyed the meeting very much because Reg Wilson won it On a serious note, it does seem odd that both the Star and Yearbook both got it wrong, perhaps got it mixed up due to the consecutive numbering. The meeting was the day after the BLRC and billed as "a BLRC for the second heat leaders" so although I can't remember Dave being in it, it would stand to reason he would have been of the calibre to be invited.

And it could be argued those two semi finals showed a decline in previous standards, when you look at that 1976 British Final.

I saw this a few weeks ago, but I'm coming back to it again as this was my first "proper" meeting, and was 38 years ago today. I did remember that Sheffield won, and the injuries to Crump, Ashby and Mauger, and also that Scott Autrey had to miss a couple of heats due to making his bike race worthy again, and Michael Lee getting a faultless maximum. I had completely forgotten about there only being 3 points between the top 4 pairs, but who knows what might have happened if Mike the Bike had had a partner the whole way through! (Oh, the irony that it was his partner that turned up late, bearing future seasons in mind... ) Justice then that KL ended up making the final at Ipswich. I'd also completely forgotten about Carl Glover being one of the reserves, bit puzzling as he had left Sheffield by then, mind you, he was local obviously, and also could legitimately have represented King's Lynn! For a semi final, what a stellar line up it was, even allowing that it didn't include Reg Wilson, PC, Bob Kilby and Terry Betts, presumably all injured (well, PC's would have been the leg injury)

Anyone who doubts Tony Mac's post on the John Louis book topic should just take a look at that.... I could hardly believe what I was reading at some points of it.... in fact, I still can't I completely agree - it happened all the time, the only thing Bruce did wrong was how he executed it. For example, British semi final at Sheffield in 1980, Dave Jessup I think unbeaten up to that point and Michael Lee who needed points to get through to the British Final, both of course then at King's Lynn, met in the last hat, needless to say Mike the Bike wins in order to get his requisite points, and the rest, as they say, is history... I also went to an Overseas Final at Coventry, think it was 1994, the one where Joe Screen was struggling, and Jeremy Doncaster who had the points in the bag already went out and finished ahead of him in their last race - I walked past the pits afterwards and a group of fans were stood on those steps to the home straight bar which overlook the pits, hurling abuse at the Donc, because he HADN'T let Joe through! I agree, he could afford to do it just for his "beer money" as I would say, whereas others needed to earn the money just to live.

I don't remember hearing anything at the PLRC either, I guess we have to assume by this stage that there won't be.

I seem to remember years ago there was a big hoo ha about Carlos Villar, he wasn't allowed to be a mechanic because he wasn't allowed in the pits, and I believe that came down to H & S too in the end. Unfortunately Owlerton seems to have to suffer with overzealous stewarding/H & S jobsworths due to its proximity to the Hillsborough stadium.

As Tigerish says, the dogs run on Saturday nights, has always been so (well, as far as I can remember) even before the current owners.

It would have to be at a different venue as well, if you want a Saturday night meeting. Ulrich and Cookie were the two best from the qualifiers, so it was right that one of them won IMO. I know a Grand Final makes it more exciting, but personally I loathe that way of deciding a meeting. I thought Brady Kurtz was very lucky to get up from that crash, as he seemed to somersault over the handlebars and then his bike landed behind him. Sympathies also to Edward Kennett, with his bike failing at the start of the semi final, bit of an expensive weekend for him as I was told (and some people on here of course would have seen it) later on that he'd also blown an engine at Berwick the night before!

It isn't faster when you look at the track records in more detail. As Andrew has said, the track record in 1970 was 67.2. At the end of 1988, after which Sheffield closed for a couple of seasons, it was 60.7, held by Chris Morton. So that's a reduction of 6.5 seconds over 18 seasons. After the reopening in 1991, this record did not go until July 1998 when Carl Stonehewer reduced it to 60.6. So, bearing in mind the current record is 59.1, that's only a reduction of 1.6 over approximately 25 seasons, and Ricky's record is almost 5 years old now.

I read your book over the Cardiff GP weekend, Norbold, have finally got around to writing a review of sorts on my Goodreads account. I can never find the dividing line in being too brief or sounding too pretentious! https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23398323-pie-n-mash-and-prefabs Mine was on Kindle, but I have seen it in WH Smith in the shopping centre at the other end of my village (post code S20 7PN) - I reckon that's a lot off the beaten track!

Excellent - Alan Carter's book and Simmo's were the two in particular (after Kenny's) that I was hoping for, as regards to becoming available on Kindle.

I think they are the same person - purely on the basis of what daveallan81 says, and also I got his autograph once, and Hans was clearly written as the first name.

And by the looks of things at other clubs, other promoters are spending monopoly money too!! Exactly, some fans need to realise that the speedway is 3rd out of 3 with regard to popularity of the sports that take place at Owlerton, therefore we have the least bargaining points, and if the only way of continuing with speedway in Sheffield means having to race on Sundays, then that is what will happen. Of course, that doesn't mean everyone has to like it! That said, I don't work on Sundays so I would still be able to go.