spook

Would love to see the heat times of the first 4 heats......... Kasprich is on a flying machine!

aka cheating! for the first year so far i'm finding myself cheering him on for it though

Iversen 11 Hampel 8 Zagar 8 Woffinden/Madsen 3 trusting Iversen & Zagar in the GP's ... I must be mad cheers

Group 1 Woffinden Group 2 Holder Group 3 Hancock Group 4 Lindgren Group 5 Kasprzak Final Woffinden Sayfutdinov Holder Pedersen cheers

Unless the mehod of picking wildcards is about to change then we know exactly what to expect: 1) nationality quota 2) box office draw 3) top 8 standard who has been injured 4) Brits are always included (and most likely would also be the case for swedes, danes and poles if they were in our state) anyone who ends up with 4 qualified riders can whistle for getting any more... then there are those nationalities where 4 is deemed to be too many anyway so they should be considering 2 or 3 being their maximum............. anyone like Ward who misses out because of injury is rock solid ...unless too many from their country qualify ie Holder, Batch/Watt etc i'd suggest the change of cardiff wildcard criteria indicates Bomber has a strong chance of a wildcard for next season Looking at the standings right now then I believe BSI would be looking at ..........Ward, Bomber.... Iversen is the 2nd Dane which would be their minimum quota......... followed by Lindgren & Jonsson........... they would want a 3rd Pole & I guess Kasprzak would be considered but they have never shown much of a need to keep him around before ..............One thing BSI have always struggled with is leaving someone out of the picks who finished below 8th and then picking someone below them so it would be difficult for BSI to pick MJJ instead of Iversen & then pick Iversen and/or Jonsson as someone else has said the high chance of greg/tomasz (& maybe nickip) retirement could make things very easy for BSI...... and the GP qualifier result usually ends up easing the issues

Gollob Hampel Woffinden Zagar Feels a bit top heavy but having trouble relying on the guys with the low predictions

woop woop

Tai Woffinden Matej Zagar Jarek Hampel Emil Sayfutdinov

good luck with that

watch the start again... i'm not so certain .... maybe once the two of them were clear it was all bets off? absolutely classic GP ... Bydgoszcz at its best

now we get to see if there is a 'Team Oz' in the GP's this year.... edit: hmmmm difficult one to call.... looked like Darcy 'deferred' to Noddy at the start........... if there was a plan then i'm sure Noddy wont be too pleased with Darcy risking it all later on

i'm all for it when it comes to Tai tbh..... in years gone by it has been bordering on farcical the amount of times we have cut to Mark/Lee/Scott/Bomber having a microphone stuck in their faces..... especially when they were having a decent night......... I cant imagine it helps with keeping their head in the right place Well happy with Tai tonight..... he's not just fast but he is also sticking the bike in all the right places..................hope that engine lasts all season!

Sayfutdinov 11 Hampel 10 Woffinden 5 Vaculik 4 cheers

I didnt call him stupid..... I said it was something he didnt excel in........ yes for sure Bomber's machinery & gating didnt help him, but that wasnt the end of the story IMO... amongst the top 16 Bomber's decisions were left wanting on too many occasions

it looks to me like Tai's recent words concerning Peter Johns and Chris Holder are appropriate and he has found himself a good engine.......... he was looking super fast on the night which must be giving him lots of confidence for the series ahead.................. now we will see how much intelligence he can show on track..... something which Bomber did not excel in

It aint broke so dont fix it

thx for organising this TNT 10 Hancock 12 Holder 8 Gollob 6 Vaculik SELL Ward $7 BUY Jonsson $3

Iversen may be a different rider this season but GP history dictates that it is a rare thing for a rider who has bombed so badly before to come back and have a successful season..............as far as I can remember there is only Lindback & Bomber who could be described as achieving this I'm certainly expecting Zagar to be a struggler..... but Iversen is going to have to follow in Lindback's suprising footsteps if he is going to avoid past disasters

they don't care.... if they cared they would have done something 5/10/20 years ago.... and they certainly don't care about how it affects IMG this is just another from a long list of issues where they refuse to see further than the end of their noses................... I suspect that even if there was a shared understanding and need for a movement between the promoters, that the worst time to try to do something about it is in the middle of a recession I came to the conclusion some time ago that British speedway is all but dead and will remain so until something miraculous happens like a sugar daddy comes along, or proper businessmen get involved

tbh though its kind of been the point for me ever since we first started seeing the replays of the incident....... as a ref he was never going to be able to hide from the incident or the need to make a decision..................... if he was lucky enough for a bonafide all 4 back to land in his lap then phew and good luck to the guy........................ but it wasnt a straight forward all 4 back and in his efforts to avoid the issue and 'bottle' or allow it to 'be decided on track' he quickly became part of the incident and consequently history rather him than me but he shouldnt have become a ref if he wasnt happy to make the decisions when they are needed. There is also something to say here about the fact that this took place in a GP series................. forget for one second that it took place in the semi final of the final GP with 6 points in it.......... ultimately for a ref this should be no less important than any other race during the series......if the same situation took place with Lindback wiping out Gollob in a ht13 at Terenzano would we have seen the same decision made? Congrats to Chris Holder and 10 times out of 10 I would prefer him to win a title over Nicki..............but unfortunately, despite Nicki's lack of engine power towards the end of the night, mathematically it was very possible that Nicki could have equalled or beaten that 6 point gap .......................and that for me is always going to haunt the 2012 GP series

the problem with this though is that ultimately it isnt a great deal different to when the GP field was 24 riders 10 years ago ........ The riders who found themselves on the fringes found it difficult to fight their way out and visibly started spending less money..... guys like Michael Max, Todd Wiltshire, Bo Brhel, Jason Lyons, Mark Loram couldnt make it work and had no financial incentive to stick around.... Your model... although good for giving 4 more riders a turn to ride.... would theoretically see a bigger difference in the quality of sponsorship, crew & equipment between the top 10 and the bottom 10 Maybe if IMG can build on the Monster sponsorship and attract other big hitters in the future ...a GP2 might be possible...

doesnt history indicate that IMG carry more weight than the FIM over wild cards Philip?...... otherwise i'm sure we wouldnt be talking about Tai at this moment in time (or bomber/scott/tai in previous years) isnt it actually the case that the FIM make suggestions that are passed to IMG? I'm vaguely remembering many seasons where we have heard Zagar or similar have been proposed by the FIM but IMG have gone their own way............. the wild cards are usually pretty obvious and easy to predict ....but only if you take into account what corporate IMG want.... and not what world governing body FIM want

IMG have always been between a rock & a hard place over this ..... & despite Crumpy's retirement making it easier for them MJJ & Vaculik failing to qualify undid that if MJJ is to be left out, then I kind of understand their reasoning as he is very young and theoretically it won't hurt him to sit out for another year............................... however, as a few always maintain on here, it should be the riders in form who are included..... not riders who were in form 18 months previously......... Historically IMG are all about precedents.... and one has just been set here for the modern GP era if MJJ is to be left out....... you arent safe if you won a GP during the season This year more than any other I think we can see the gap between the Brits and the world's best....... I wish Tai all the best and hope that he learns from Scott, & Bomber's failings ...... but quite simply MJJ should be there instead

Doesn't the nature of a Grand Prix series mean that this race was as important as the 3rd race of the 4th GP, Or the first race of the first GP? I'm not sure as a fan I would be happy that decisions werent being made in all races (or even specific) so riders could decide it for themselves on track........ (but werent they on track already anyway?) All 4 Back is a very nice 'rule' for a ref to fall back on...... i'm sure refs of other sports are very envious of such a nice cushion....... but it still needs to be a bonafide situation to use it..... I've said elsewhere that no one likes to get in the way during a title battle .....but in his efforts to not be involved and be remembered for getting involved in the title run in ...the ref still managed to do just that

careful Nicki gets half his rep from hamming things up ...... and look what he won tonight .....