Parsloes 1928 nearly

I know too, coz I was there with you...!!! Waiting in vain for that pint!!!

Good God...: I never knew that!!! Thanx to you both for this. Funny enuff I do am looking for a Boston badge from the same year as you, 1976 as that was the year I first attended a meeting at New Hammond Beck Road and am trying to collect a badge from each track the first year I went there..!!

Okay - apologise for that. I was looking at the results and fixtures 'chart' in today's Speedway Star which shows the Dudly vs. Plymouth NL match as Sept. 22nd.!! Obviously that's incorrect... It has to be noted how good everyone's been at getting fixtures arranged this year with special note to Bournemouth and Dudley, who have successfully managed to get all their NL matches done before the deadline (well certainly should do now...) despite 'sharing' an Elite League track (alright, I know the Heathens use Birmingham too but the majority of fixtures have been at Monmore Green...) A lesson which one hopes other EL clubs might follow - that it IS possible to host an NL team as well -; and such a startling contrast from the previous top league club to have a stab at having a third tier team too...: Oxford, who staged 2/3rds of their fixtures after the start of October!!! Yes, but the loss to rain last Saturday of such a potentially vital fixture as this one has rather queered the pitch... Can it not be slotted in earlier than this..? A double header perhaps..?

This was the latest we heard on this.. I note though that at least one fixture, Dudley vs. Plymouth is scheduled for later than this date.. Has the deadline changed..?

According to the League table Rye had loads of matches left to go (in hand..) - they CAN get sufficient points for 4th. but I guess yes the side is weakened now... Any idea when they'll likely to have finished their fixtures..?

The Greyhound Derby..?? Now you've got me confused..? Why would the Greyhound Derby website want to have a pic of a Boston Speedway badge (from 1976 or any year for that matter.. ) on it...

Hmm, I do think Tom is slightly understating this. He appeared in a Dragons meeting at Sittingbourne (Iwade) on 16/11/2008 finishing third behind Dutch rider Benjamin Borgers and Mark Baldock (wonder what ever happened to Mark..: he seemed hugely promising..).. Of the programme, I can appreciate how disappointing this must have been. Mind you it was a very big crowd and it should be noted that at the corresponding fixture earlier this year at Monmore Green, the progs sold out there too!! If it's any help I have a copy I'm happy to send free of charge to any Heathens fan who PMs me his/her details requesting it. Obviously only the one but it's an offer if anyone wants to take it up.. It is, I'm afraid filled in - including obviously as you point out the crossing out in heat three when the ref made his gaffe!!

Indeed I am - of his youth in particular!!!! It must be heartening for you too, to see riders young enuff to be your grand-children like Deano still doing so well!!

Happy birthday, Deano... I suppose you'll be going out on the town around the fleshpots of Widnes tonight to celebrate..!!??

Thanx. Bu88er it...: bloody work meeting that morning!! Grr!!!

But that's NOT the case is it.. Won't be happening THIS year but in other GP series the overall World Champ has been decided a couple of rounds from the end making those last rounds meaningless in terms of the big prize. If I was promoting (for the sake of argument!!) a final GP at Wembley or the Olympic Stadium (both of which would be big crowd pullers IF the world championship depended on them..) and the title was decided before that meeting I'd be well hacked off. Of course in such a format that happening is possible even likely...: hence why you'll never get better box office than a proper World Final.. The tennis argument doesn't hold up... Each tournament in tennis is a stand-alone and it's in any case a knock-out sport..

No, I still don't really "get it" and your proposed formula only makes it even more illogical. The idea of the GP series is that the best (and most consistently good...) rider ends up World Champ. So have ten (or whatever...) 20 heat indiv. meetings add all the points up and hey presto, you have a winner. Yet for some reason each round (even though the actual purpose of that round is for riders to accrue points towards their final and decisive total) has to have a 'winner' Well that's okay, it DOES... The rider finishing with the most points in that meeting, as in Speedway individual meetings since time immemorial is the meeting winner! As these are styled as GPs then sure, if there's a tie for first (or second or third too..) why, of course,, have a run-off: but that run-off would not accrue extra points.. Yet we have this S/F and Final process and actually award extra points for the global total within them.. It's this I don't get - surely that process is illogical, allowing some riders extra points-scoring rides ahead of others..? And how would your system work...? Those with two chances get even more opportunity to score points... The GP system I can live with if it adopts a sensible format OR if it was merely stand-alone each time but it's a strange hybrid ATM which at its top end loses the plot...

Now I've long been a critic of the GP system (the decision to abandon the greatest event in world sport, the one-off World Speedway Final was a literal crime..) but I have to say that having watched on Sky this year far more of the series than previously, there's no question that the sheer quality of the Speedway is absolutely outstanding. Now I understand that the winner these days of the World individual championship is decided over the aggregate of all the rounds. What I don't get at all is what's actually the point of having the semis and finals... After all, gone arethe days when big points bunce were given to the winner of the Grand Final - so all it is, is giving an extra ride to the top eight and then an extra ride (with dounble points for three of them) to four of these.. Why bother..? Surely if there's an argument that the World Champ is the one who scores the most points over, what is ten or so rounds, then just stick with that... I honestly can't see the logic behind the S/Fs and Final, other than to produce a sudden death way of deciding the winner of that Round. But as that winner is rewarded with only scant extra points where's the logic in that..??

Having just watched my Skyplussed copy of the GP have to say that the racing was superb. For some time now I've felt that Gollob has been the best rider never to be World Champ (actually TBH he's miles clear by any indicator in holding that distinction..) but having watched him race this year to me he's actually one of the greatest riders ever...period! If he doesn't get the World title he so richly desrrves this year then there seriously ain't no justice...

Phew, Redcar to Plymouth..! That's some journey! Why, even the original Viking long-boats would've stuggled with that one... Mind you they stopped for a bit of pillaging on the way!!

Hmm, not sure if this is the only thread for this subject (surprising that no-one commented on it...! ) - but I'm hardly helping, coz mine is just a fairly random question! Does anyone know what time the Practice for this on the Saturday is..? Advertised on the SGB site as a public-allowed event...

You can try!!!! Problem might be weather forecasts (my pet hate!) - being October, they MAY predict rain. Not like beautifully dry August, eh..! NOT! Like this last Friday: WOULD have done down to the SBA to support the Buccs but the forecasts for both there and Weymouth were a little dodgy. So opted to do King's Lynn (with Lakeside a reluctant 'back-up'). Both meetings out west went on ; KL and AE flooded out!! Grr!!

Well done... And glad to see that you're calling the league by its correct name now!! Now can someone 'bring on' a date for the, er, restaging of this meeting..?!! There's an end of August deadline for fixtures in the NL is there not..?

Congrats on the nonsense post of this season so far!!

Thank goodness for rocketrod and psymon – people talking sense amongst so many either missing the point or merely showing their total lack of knowledge about the area or the potential for this! We’ve had this ‘debate’ so many times on here…: let’s get this straight, no-one supporting the use of Wembley and/or the Olympic Stadium for major Speedway is saying that Cardiff can’t carry on too… Why do people never seem to get this simple point…?! As Cardiff is the capital city of one country and London the capital city of another, it’s hardly rocket science to call one the Welsh GP and the other the English GP. As someone said Poland (just a single country..!) has THREE in the current calendar anyhow!! These sort of comments made about the area (the East End) beggar belief. I’ve worked in East London for nearly all of my working life: my office now is half a mile from the Olympic Stadium and my job involves the regeneration of the area in general. Do people REALLY believe that the area surrounding the Olympic Stadium will be slums out of Arthur Morrison’s ‘Child of the Jago’, crossed with alleyways like those Jack the Ripper plied his trade in, in nearby Whitechapel of the 1880s…??!! Hundreds of thousands will visit the site watching all the Olympic events – they’ll be a huge amount of facilities there to cope with that: not good enuff for Speedway folk though..? Get real!! It’s also a very short tube journey to central London. The last time I looked London had rather more to recommend it as a place to visit than Cardiff…: but maybe Speedway folk know better, eh..?! As for this general negativity that the scheme could never work..: I disagree fundamentally. As psymon says, a fundamental part of the ‘legacy’ is that the main stadium gets used. It HAS to remain with an Athletics track (I believe this rules out the West Ham United idea…) and converting to use for Speedway would be a relatively simple (simpler than Cardiff…) operation. I’d go as far to say that IF a big enough company came forward prepared to stage Speedway there it’s a nigh on 100% certainty that the authorities would approve it. I also believe that a very big Speedway event in the Olympic Stadium would almost certainly attract a capacity crowd. Think about it, 40k go to Cardiff – despite the whingers on here, virtually all of these would come to the Olympic Stadium. Then there are the many Speedway fans who don’t go to Cardiff each year – the lure of a new venue and it being in what will for a while be the most famous stadium in the world will attract them. Then there’s the huge currently untapped market for Speedway in London. This is probably at its biggest in East London – former West Ham and Hackney people, their kids (and grand-kids!), the large Polish contingent (many of whom are helping to build the place!). Then there’s all those who’ll want to see the Stadium and especially motor sports folk – many of whom wouldn’t consider going to the likes of (nearby) Arena Essex but for which this would be a different ball-game. Plus all those from abroad for whom a trip to such an event would be a massive draw. I’ll admit it might not necessarily be possible to sustain a capacity crowd year in year out for Speedway at the Olympic Stadium but for the first event…?: I’d be very confident of a full house… I agree salty that for ongoing Speedway (i.e. a London league team) there are far more suitable venues than the main Stadium within the overall Olympic Park. I firmly believe a reasoned argument to have a small Speedway facility on site would win the day with the powers that be. We have so many arguments on our side. Hmm, like where..?? No existing Speedway venue could fit the bill… I have only one concern. A single GP is a fairly pointless meeting: there’s no proper outcome, unlike a World Final. I’d be concerned that a mere ‘qualifying round’ type event which is basically all a GP is, wouldn’t be big enough for such a venue. But that’s for a different ‘debate’ perhaps..

Er, any date for this one yet..? No mention on the Scunny website..

Surprised that no-one's mentioned the extraordinary refereeing decision in heat 3 of this one..! Perhaps by the end we were all so knackered it slipped everyone's memory... Mark & Kyle were leading clearly for the Buccs with Jake Anderson a distant third. Coming onto the second bend of the third lap, Anderson lost shape completely and came to grief with his team mate, Tom Perry some way further behind having to take evasive action and also falling. The race was stopped and (correctly, obviously) awarded as a 5-1. But to the incredulity of all (and surely everyone by then had filled in their prog. to give Tom the one point..!)the decision was to exclude Perry and award the one point to Anderson..!! Clearly the ref got this badly wrong...! He too must've been flagging badly by then! No difference to result of heat or match of course, but certainly a bizarre moment...

Tom came second in a Club championship meeting at Sittingbourne in a meeting in 2008 so it's certainly NOT the case that he hadn't ridden 'til this year..

Goodness me: for the second time in three days the Buccs concede a 5-1c in heat 15 to lose a bonus point... I do hope those two bonus points won't prove crucial at the end of the campaign...

But just think of the noise problems - not to mention all the traffic and crowds: especially for Young Stars' matches...! Wouldn't like to see you become a NIMBY in your (very...) advanced years!!