Bavarian

Chris Slabon grew up and learned his speedway in Canada before he came over to Europe and rode in the Polish League (for Wroclaw I seem to remember). As far as I know, Chris has a Canadian passport, which entitles him to represent this country. He is the son of a speedway rider, the former world finalist Robert Slabon, who emigrated with his family from Poland to Canada.

Racing admittedly wasn't of the highest calibre last night, but it wasn't that bad either. But, hey, there was a massive 15,000+ crowd at Vojens last night. A packed stadium, just aweseome to see. Vojens is well and truely the heart of Danish speedway, and people love it there. Vojens, just like Prague, is an anchor venue for the SGP, even if the racing is not always as good as it should be.

Your points system in British League speedway is well and truely unique. I don't like it. No other speedway league in the rest of the world needs such a complex points system. I'd recommend You to adopt the Polish League system as much as is possible. It is simple and it works perfectly well.

We have Celina Liebmann riding in the 500cc class here in Germany. She looks and behaves more like a boy, though. She is currently the best of a number of young female speedway riders, the others are riding in the youth 250cc, 125cc, and 50cc classes.

Test matches with all of the best riders (Woffinden) would draw a goood crowd. Great Britain v Australia at Glasgow last year, that was quite a good event. Why do they need a national team manager at all, when the national team does not have any meetings, other than a couple of SoN best pairs events. They could use anyone to pose as their team manager on that occasions. The lack of a genuine international team competitions is such a shame. Mr.Castagna and the FIM are useless, they do not even realise what is missing. I'd love to see a speedway tournament such as Rugyby's Six Nations. And they should bring back the Speedway World Cup, perhaps only every four years, that would make it something really special. But where there is NO will, sadly there is NO way. Oh well, I'll watch the Rugby World Cup instead then!

Boring? Come on, man! Except for Leszno dominating at the top, the Ekstraliga this year was tremendously exciting. Who would have thought that Gorzow and Torun finish the season in the relegaton zone. All meetings were generally excellent throughout the season, and attracted big crowds, and that even with live tv coverage for the first time of EVERY meeting.

Other than the Speedway of Nations, are there any meetings that the British speedway team takes part at all ?

Must say I'd rather have Zagar and Iversen back, than Bjerre and Harris ! Smolinski came close, too, but the start marshall waved him off with the checkered flag after only three laps when he was winning his second race, and instead of another three points in his pocket, he earned himself an exclusion in the re-run. Tough luck for the German Champion !

Correct, but it was Pila (not Poznan)

Oh what a sad joke. Once again, when our riders once in a while are asked to travel to Russia, they withdraw ! Why do they compete in the qualifying rounds at all when they don't want to come to the final???? There should be sanctions against the DMSB ! Yet, on the other hand, it is always taken for granted that the Russians travel to all kinds of qualifying rounds across Europe, but for them it is just as far to travel as it is fro our boys to come to Russia. Sad, really sad, to see a makeshift Young Europe pair compete and devalue this Championship once again.

The European Championship final takes place today at Eenrum in the Netherlands. Lots of British Teams involved in this event. here is the line-up Line-up: 1 - Rafael SAN MILLAN / Benedikt Zapf (Deutschland) 2 - Markus VENUS / Markus Heiß (Deutschland) 3 - Wilfred DETZ / Wendy Arling (Nederland) 4 - Aaron VALE / Stephen Vale (Great Britain) 5 - Natasha BARTLETT / Kim Kempa (Great Britain) 6 - Oliver MÖLLER / Dana Frohbös (Deutschland) 7 - Sven HOLSTEN / Bonita van Dijk (Nederland) 8 - Mitch GODDEN / Paul Smith (Great Britain) 9 - Dave CARVILL / Dennis Smit (Great Britain) 10 - William MATTHIJSSEN / Sandra Mollema (Nederland) 11 - Josh GOODWIN / Liam Brown (Great Britain) 12 - Shaun HARVEY / Danny Hogg (Great Britain) 13 - Mike FREDERIKSEN / Steven Grandt (Danmark) Meeting has just started a few minutes ago (12.30 p.m) live result up-dates can be found here https://live.baansportfansite.nl/event/382/ek-zijspan-finale-eenrum.html

Zach Wajtknecht won the European Championship tonight at Hersfeld near Frankfurt in Germany. Paul Hurry second, and a Dane, Kenneth Kruse Hansen third. Five Brits in the top six, and for once all of the Germans were beaten out of sight, what an amazing result ! Here are the complete results https://live.baansportfansite.nl/event/379/ek-grasbaan-finale-bad-hersfeld.html

AH, ok. then. I was just wondering because his crash was in his first ride, but he went on to score eleven points from his remainig four outings, so there was no indication of an injury when I was checking his Polish League scores.

Torun management are once again playing games. It is rumored they are confident of staying in the Ekstraliga next year, because Lublin could be thrown out of the league. Lublin allegedly has not done enough durign this year to bring their stadium up to Ekstraliga level. Torun expect that Lublin's Ekstraliga license will be revoked for next year and Lublin be directly relegated to Liga 1, instead of Torun. Not sure if there is much evidence behind this rumors, but knowing the past record of the Torun club's management, they are up to anything and everything to gain an advantage (remember their attempted bribary in the Promotion/Relegation matches against Gdansk a couple of years ago). Some say that Torun is the headquarter of the Polish Speedway Mafia. Who knows?

Why? What's the problem with him? He rode for Czestochowa against Grudziadz in the Polish League https://sportowefakty.wp.pl/zuzel/relacja/94532/forbet-wlokniarz-czestochowa-mrgarden-gkm-grudziadz yesterday, completed the meeting and scored eleven points. What happened?

AFT at Perris Speedway, Southern California

American Flat Track Motorcycle Racing in New Hampshire at the Laconia Short Track

https://youtu.be/wTRxhmEJRzU?list=PLqCMYshgHh8ZQqspWn3jFOor863gVJJsu

Not so, it is now definitely off for tonight, since the Danes refused to ride. The Poles wanted to get the meeting done with tonight, and run at least 12 heats to get a result. The French and the Swedes were willing to ride, but not so the Danes. The organisers won't be able to re-run tomorrow, which leaves the outcome of this event in doubt.

https://www.speedwaynews.pl/aktualnosci/item/64045-vani-ek-obronil-na-motoarenie-puchar-europy-125cc-makowski-najlepszy-z-polakow

It was the wrong hymn, and OneSport has done the same thing twice this year, after Chugunov had won the world u21 round in Poland last month, they did it too. On purpose perhaps? This is what Wikipedia writes about this outdated and unpopular hymn, that was played for the winner at Güstrow last night: The lyric-free "Patrioticheskaya Pesnya", composed by Mikhail Glinka, was officially adopted in 1990 by the Supreme Soviet of Russia and confirmed in 1993, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, by the President of the Russian Federation, Boris Yeltsin. This anthem proved to be unpopular with the Russian public and with many politicians and public figures, because of its tune and lack of lyrics, and consequently its inability to inspire Russian athletes during international competitions. The government sponsored contests to create lyrics for the unpopular anthem, but none of the entries were adopted. Glinka's anthem was replaced soon after Yeltsin's successor, Vladimir Putin, first took office on 7 May 2000. The federal legislature established and approved the music of the National Anthem of the Soviet Union, with newly written lyrics, in December 2000, and it became the second anthem used by Russia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Yeltsin criticized Putin for supporting the reintroduction of the Soviet-era national anthem even though opinion polls showed that many Russians favored this decision.

Who cares about race times? I don't get it, what's so important about it? This is speedway racing and it is about race winners and place getter, but totally irrelevant what times are achieved. Here in Bavaria we ususally don't get told the race times at the meetings, but they usually do tell us the average speed achieved by the race winner, at least when he was really fast. Then at some tracks (Pocking for example) they do not even employ a time keeper at all. The F.I.M. does not make it mandatory to have a time keeper.

Way too expensive that. Many would watch the live streaming if it is for free, but hardly anyone would pay for it.

Smolinski would have been first choice, but for personal reasons he has opted out of the SoN this year. His partner is expecting their first baby and Smoli has informed the German team manager Peppi Rudolph that he wants to be by her side, rather than make the long trip to Russia.

Tonights junior meeting at Holsedt is not only a semi-final of the European U21 championship, it is also the 2019 Nordic U21 Championship Final.