Bavarian

They had a near record crowd for a Bundesliga meeting at Brokstedt of more than 4,000 which shows how attractive the new Wolfslake Falubaz Berlin team is. Well, and it was a public holiday, and the weather was great, too.

I have always loved International Speedway Tests much more than ordinary league meetings. This Poland v Russia meeting is absolutely great. They could so easily provide the international highlights of the season in the UK, with foreign test teams visiting with all those top stars that we don't get to see riding in the Elite League anymore. You see from the huge crowd they got at Ostrow, that an International speedway test match does appeal to the public if properly promoted. Unfortunately in Britian the BSPA bosses are just not interested in the welfare of the country, the national team and the British riders. All they seem interested in is how to gain advatages for their own clubs and harm their rivals. Very short sighted indeed. Oh how I wish to see ENGLAND ride again (please do away with that "TeamGB").

Sure, but the question is, did Ulamek beat Kolodziej, or why was there no race-off between the two Poles tied on 11 points ?

Same question goes for Lebedev and Karpov, who, just like Loktaev, are Russian by birth, but decided to emigrate.

O.k., I really did not understand how it was meant. But are tehre no other British riders good enough to ride in such a big international meeting? Is British speedway already at such a low level that they should better be left out of a top 7 nations of the world event? I would not have thought so, but some people on this forum seem to be of that opinion. Well, most likely now the USA will take the place that the Brits did not want. I guess is, the USA will be represented by Greg Hancock and Ricky Wells.

Why didn't he ride for Denmark U-21 on teh Sunday in Germany ? He was also dropped by his Polish club Czestochowa for the Sunday league match. In his first couple of meetings for his new POlsih club he did not score much. What's his problem this year?

No meetigns scheduled for either Coventry or B'ham on Saturday June 8, so why should Drury or Horton block their star riders from representing Great Britain and let them earn some decent money in a big interantional pairs meeting in Poland that night?

The Russian line-up is very good, I only hope that Emil will ride, now that his father is seriuosly ill in a Moscow hospital. Looking forward to see the promising Ilya Chalov in action, and Borodulin is a good prospect too, but most intersting is that tiny red head Vitaly Belousov, a real battler. Oh, and I forgot to add, there is no such thing as a "friendly" match between Poland and Russia. They are arch enemies.

It was great speedway racing and great commentary work by Nigel and Kelvin last Saturday. You could not wish for any better entertainment. Pearson and Tatum are a pleasure to listen to. They are simply the best ! It is TV broadcasts on Eurosport of the quality such as the last one from Bydgoszcz that can win us new fans for the sport of motorcycle speedway racing.

Yes, perhaps for Britain (at the new Belle Vue?) one of the finals of this European Championship would be an attractive meeting to host in the future. It would be kind of a second Cardiff Grand Prix. Certainly a top meeting and a great attraction, with so many top riders (Nicki Pedersen, Gollob, Sayfutdinov, Jonsson) in it. The BSPA / ACU does the sport no favour in boycotting the European championships. Every other European nation is in it, but Britain does not want to join the party. The British riders and fans will have to watch it on the tv, the four finals of th e EC are all shown live on Europsport . And then there is that Eurosport Best Pairs meeting inTorun, which has all the best speedway nations and riders in the world take part, and will be shown live on Eurosport, too. Britain was invited, along with Poland, Denmark, Australia, Russia and Sweden, but the ACU/BSPA are the only national federation who refuse to participate. It's a shame.

Actually Travis McGowan had first been named as the stand-in team manager of Australia U21 for this meeting in Germany next week. Rossiter will take up this job now. I doubt that even Rosco can make the Aussies strong enough to beat Anders Secher's Danish quartet of Jepsen Jensen, Michelsen, Porsing and Bech on this occasion.

Isn't it strange that the BSPA /ACU put pressure on their own riders and refusing them persmission to participate in the European Championship? Scott Nicholls is forced to withdraw from taking part in this Saturday's first qualifying round in the Ukraine. What a shame!

Very disappointing that the BSPA declines the offer to send a British pair into this meeting. Surely England / GB could be competitive even without Woffy. How about Harris and Nicholls?

Will Billy Hamill be with the American U21s for the junior world cup qualifyer at Neustadt in Germany? I read that Lawrence Rogers will be the team manager there. Is Austin Novratil in the U.S. team for this meeting?

It is certainly one of the oldest. l can only think of the Australian title that goes back a couple of years further (1926), and some of their State championships (Victoria 1926/27 season), Western Australia and Queensland (1927/28 season). I agree, the Edinburgh promotion should make much more of a big deal of this fact and promote the Scottish Open Championship as THE speedway event of the year in Scotland.

Until now, he is not listed in any of the German League team squads. My guess it that he will ride in England this year.

I would also go so far as to doubt the loyality of any one of my team's riders when he accepts a guest booking for one of my rival teams in the league. The conflict of interests is obvious. This can't be accepted. The rider's loyalty has to be with his OWN club.

How comes that only Britain needs this guest rider system, when Poland, Denmark, Sweden, Russia and all the rest can do without it? Sorry, I can't agree with anyone telling me that this is a neccessary evil, it is certainly not neccessary. Guest riders could only be accepted if they do not already ride in one of the same league's other teams. That means, a guest rider could only come from another league (Premiere league) or from another country / foreign league. It is this current guest rider rule that more than anything else takes away all the credibility from the british speedway leagues in the eyes of the general sports public and media. Along with that golden double joker rule, this gives speedway the image of being just a fun event, a circus, a show, but not a real sport.

FIM Oceania organise an international sidecar speedway championship in November of 2013. This Oceania championship fills the void left by the abandonement of the FIM 1,000cc Sidecar Speedway World Championship, which is sadly discontinued. FIM Oceania, the new continental motorcycle sports federation for the Australia, New Zealand and South Pacific area, make this championship an international open competition and invites sidecar drives from anywhere in the world (U.K., S.Africa, U.S.A., Canada etc) Here is a link to the press release http://www.speedwayb...ESS_RELEASE.pdf and here are the supplementary regulations http://www.speedwayb...nia_Sidecar.pdf

Thank god, it's off (for now). A champions league in speedway sounds good in theory, but would not be such a good thing in reality for our sport. As long as it isn't one man / one club as in football, this will always cause problems. Different rules in the respective nations domestic league competitions does not make it any easier (Denmark for example has five-man teams in their league). What would work is a tournament for national teams, eg. England v Sweden, Poland v Denmark, Australia v Russia. Each rider would know where he belongs. But that would generate TV money only for the national bodies in those countries, and not for the club bosses, so the BSPA would probably not be interested.

Has it been officially announced that SKY don't show the GPs anymore, or is this still only rumours?

They could make this some kind of an Overseas Championship Series in contrast to the new Continental European Championship. A UK series with the top British, Aussie and American riders would be nice.

There is a German 2012 film production called Speed, Mud & Glorie, featuring Martin Smolinski and scenes of German speedway and grass track racing. There is a short teaser on Youtube, here

I really like the Leiceister Lions set up and all, but only one little thing annoys me since their return. It is the design of their race jacket logo. Sorry, but it does look childish, reminds me so much of that ill-fated Reading Bulldogs design. Leicester Lions promoters would do themselves a favour and give teh club a better image if they'd change this into something more similar looking like they had in the old days. I particularly liked the three lions emblem they used in the early 80's. Bring that back, please!

NEW ZEALAND CHAMPIONSHIP 2012/13 1. Jason Bunyan 2. Dale Finch 3. Sean Mason