Bavarian

Isn't it amazing how the Russians are able to run their ice speedway Meetings durign this oandemic, and with crowds in the Stadiums (not many wearign masks either!). Seems to be no problem there !

now LIVE on YouTube (broadcast started at 7am) DAY TWO of the Cup of Russia Ice Speedway meeting at Yugorsk

watch here (top quality!) live since 7am

at 1:50, leading the parade of the two teams, that' Bobby Beaton as captain of the Salisbury Monarchs

Yes, Laurie Etheridge is the guy in blue leathers seen walking back to the pits at 1:17 in the film. Where in the film have You seen Geoff Curtis?

Having just read this week's sequel of Brian Burford's excellent series in SPEEDWAY STAR on the History of Speedway in Rhodesia, I must say, I am absolutely fascinated. Sad but highly interesting was the part which described the fatal accident of Ricky Wolhuter as told first hand by Jon Bower, who was involved in the crash. Also this week some unexpected footage of Rhodesian speedway from 1971 has turned up on YouTube. Even though it comes without sound, this historic footage is in full color and is of very good quality. This could be the only Motion Pictures surviving to this day of speedway racing in Rhodesia. It is nine minutes with scenes of the 1971 league racing at Bulawayo and Gwelo. Easily recognizable among the riders featured are Barry Duke, Graham Plant, and Oivind Berg in his lightblue pullover. Please take a closer look at this film and let us all know which of the other riders You can identify. More info and pictures on the Rhodesian speedway history can be found on the excellent Speedway-SA website https://www.speedway-sa.com/rhodesia-2.php

Perhaps the Wight Warriors could join the French League this year ?

Bradford

Afaik this meeting has been moved to Güstrow

You can watch the complete North Brisbane Speedway Masters Meeting (four hours) re-live on vimeo https://vimeo.com/512360942/0703b26b4e?fbclid=IwAR0XljSyycr1f2SZo3b46P95-VCI8m1wP_auOpFlCfEJc77TaoAbaNXN-Ks Darcy Ward and Davey Watt doing the commentary and some interviews 24 riders, 24 heats and 8 finals plus some 250cc Junior races.

But what about the rest of the world ?

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That's what the Italians had printed in their programme. It is most probably Craig Pendlebury.

There is some mystery concerning this unofficial international speedway test match between ITALY and an ENGLAND Select, held at Castelmassa in Italy, on Sunday, September 9, 1979. The teams as listed in the programme are: Italy: Mauro Ferraccioli, Luigi Bazan, Charlie Brown (=Guiseppe Marzotto), Paolo Noro, Gianni Brizzolari, and Mario Andriolo. England: John Davis, Neil Collins, Mike Farrell, Nicky Allott, Eric Broadbelt, and Reg Pendlebury. This was not a British club team, as the six "English" riders (Farrell was actually Australian) came from five different club teams. Maybe someone can help with some background Infos to this match, and provide the result, and the individual point scorers ?

Why is that ?

Nothing that couldn't be overcome. Where there's a will, there's always a way. I have absolutely nothing against Belle Vue, I think it is a nice little stadium with a fantastic speedway track. Of course, they could stage a Grand Prix there, but I believe that a bigger stadium like Bradford (Odsal), now that it will have a permanent speedway track again, would be the better option. EUROSPORT/DISCOVERY as the new SGP/SoN rights owner from 2022 have already stated that they want to take the SGP to new places. Wouldn't You think that Bradford's Odsal Stadium would be very tempting for them?

The point is that Bradford (Odsal) will be the biggest Stadium in the UK that already has a speedway track.

no speedway tracks there

Odsal would be the only speedway stadium in England that is big enough to host a SGP, while unfortunately the Belle Vue National Stadium in Manchester isn't.

There are some great pictures of the new Odsal Stadium speedway track in this week's Speedway Star. Even if no league team is based there initially, could this magnifivent venue be used for Special Meetings, such as an English SGP perhaps, when Discovery takes over the running of the SGP series from IMG/BSI in 2022 ?

The Russian SGP at Togliatti in August may not happen due to the WADA sanctions imposed on Russia for 2021 and 2022.

I may be a dreamer, but I want Scotland to do all they can to get their own national team in Speedway once more. I know they don't have enough home grown riders at the moment, but then they must start to find and train them, or get them from elsewhere (Australia?) with Scottish ancestors. Remember what Jacky Charlton did to find players for the Irish National Football Team many years ago. It worked very well ! England and Scotland should both have their own teams again, and only on special occasions (such as the Speedway of Nations), they should and would merge into a "Team GB" (like other sports do for the Olympics). It is that tribal Thing that I miss in modern days speedway. I want Speedway to experience that same spirit of national pride and passion to get behind YOUR team, like the Scots experience every time their national Rugby Union side plays at Murrayfield. In Speedway such emotion is only found in Poland nowadays. Why not here and in all the other nations ?

@ racers and royals sadly You are probably right, it might never happen, since nobody seems to care. All the Promoters and clubs do care about are their own interests. But the International game should have absolute priority over any Club or Individual meetings. In most of our sports the national team is usually the biggest showcase to present the sport to the general sporting pulic, who take not much interest in a particular club or individual riders. But if it is their own country that is represented, they can easily identify and get behind it. The Poles pay their top riders to ride in rather meaningless friendly Internationals each year, against Russia, Denmark, Australia or the Rest of the World in recent years. Thats better than nothing, and even these meetings get supported by sponsor and tv stations and make money. If these meetings had some more meaning, being part of a major international tournament, it would make it all much more interesting. To get things off the ground in the UK, the British team (or rather England) should engage with old enemies Australia in a proper test series and compete for a special trophy, be it "The Ashes" "or someting like a "Calcutta Cup" that England and Scotland play for in Rugby Union. Give the thing a name that catches on with the public and give it some media build up. The two "tests" in Western Australia, which Woffy helped to arrange early last year, were a start. This could and should become much bigger, though. Give it a go !

Australia could be based in the UK and run their home meetings over here (maybe at Poole? )

The annual Rugby Six Nations tournament kicks-off today. Why oh why can't we have something similar in our sport ??? We now don't even have a Speedway World Cup anymore, just that rather low-key "Speedway of Nations" pairs competition. Unfortunately the FIM does nothing to highlight the team aspect of speedway - which is actually what makes our sport so great and so very different from all the other motorsports. Therefore it is time for the biggest speedway nations to take it into their own hands and organise an international team tournament featuring the five major speedway nations. Team vs team racing, with six-man sides, in a round-robin tournament with two home and two away meetings. This must not be held each year, but only every other year, or four years. Poland, Denmark, Australia, Sweden, and Great Britain should be the permanent big five members. Maybe The Rest of the World could feature with a combined side as a sixth team in the tournament, to include the minor nations' top riders. Anyway, the national teams in speedway desperately need some kind of an international tournament. Currently we only have the SoN, and possibly one or two friendly internationals, like the Poles have each year. This is not enough and fails to capture the imagiantion of the sporting public, when there is no major tournament to look forward to. So if the FIM does not let us have a World Cup, there should at least be something else, such as a Five (or Six) Nations Cup speedway tournament. I guess that the fans, the riders, sponsors and TV stations in Poland, Denmark, Sweden, Australia and the UK would not vote againt this.