Grachan

I was thinking that too. I'm not sure about it myself. I prefer the winner of the final being the winner of the meeting, and I've always found that a good thing with the GP. Also, you can follow the current format relatively easy on in that if someone is riding then they are still in with a chance of winning the meeting. Simple. On top of that, I don't like it when a rider can score a 15 point maximum in his programmed rides, then be KOd in the semi by an ef and finish 8th, so whichever way it's done is, in my opinion, not as good as the way it is done now, which I think works very well over a series of meetings. The 'new' system will need a lot of score-keeping in order to know how it is going - fine for the standard speedway fan, but maybe not so much for the newcomers, who must be taken into account if the GP is to grow. Having said that, though, if you are going to keep a scorecard, then the new system will certainly involve less writing.

Having looked at that site and seen the address Target Road, Tipnor meant I could look it up on Streetmap.co.uk. That's definitely the stadium I saw.

No doubt about it, Leigh Adams is a quality rider and has been the best in the EL this year. He's shown he can do it at GP level too, with some GP wins under his belt. There just seems to be something missing when it comes to making the final step to becoming World Champion. For the last few years there has been a feeling that Jason Crump was a World Champion in waiting, but I just don't get that with Leigh. There is no doubt that he is good enough to be World Champion, but I don't think it would be a major shock if he never made it.

BASINGSTOKE!!????

So, will Robin Askwith be starring in the movie version following his trial run in Eastenders?

Is that the best speedway book ever?

I've certainly never heard of a track in Portsmouth either. On page 31 of Backtrack, though, there is an advert for a video of cine film from old tracks, and one of those listed is Portsmouth. Colchester is another one I've never heard of that gets mentioned.

I notice in Backtrack this month there is reference to a track in Portsmouth. This interested me, as earlier this year I worked in Portsmouth for a couple of weeks and, on the way into the City(?), I noticed a Greyhound Stadium to my left which looked a perfect venue for Speedway. So, where was Portsmouth Speedway, and when was racing held there? Was it at this location that I described or elsewhere? My normally trusty Dictionary of British Speedway tracks from a History of Speedway book has no mention of a track in Portsmouth.

I remember Dag at Oxford, where he went following Ole Olsen's refusal to join the World Championships unfortunately. If a track was wet he was virtually unbeatable. Didn't he practice on frozen lakes in Norway or something like that? My main memory, oddly enough, is watching him going round Cowley in the snow in a farce of a match against Cradley United, when the Cradley team all went home due to the conditions and Oxford rode unchallenged to win 58-14. (PS - I've just read this again and it would seem that a whole section of my first paragraph has gone astray. I originally wrote - honest! - that Olsen refused to join the Rebels and Dag was a great rider but had little success in the World Championships.)

I loved Anders' description of the time he got excluded for bringing off Peter Collins. 'I didn't touch him... well, maybe moved his leg a little bit.'

It's arrived! Can I come down from the very naughty step now?

SHAN'T! YOU GET ONTO THE VERY NAUGHTY STEP! NUR!

That's me! My mummy told me to sit on the naughty stair 40 years ago and forgot to tell me I could come back.

I shall have to sit on the bottom stair tomorrow and wait for postie.

Because I haven't! I'm feeling all left out here.

Norbold?

Good win by Clivehitch. If only Ron Byford had remembered to use tacticals it could have been a different story. 1. Martin Ashby 2. Bob Kilby 3. Andrew Silver 4. Shawn McConnell 5. Phil Crump 6. Leigh Adams 7. Simon Stead!!

Difficult one this. I think it was a good thing at the start of the season in terms of team building. The top riders were distributed around and there were very close matches across the board. The problems came when teams wanted to change - Coventry being the obvious case. Maybe once the first change of average date is reached then a points limit could be set for team changes from that date on. I know that is just further complications to rules, but it isn't one that really effects supporters and, in particular, newcomers. All this makes it difficult to know which was to vote, but, once I've read the quation carefully, I'll vote to keep it because I suppose that is what I'd be doing.

It would be interesting to get his perspective on the 1973 KO Cup race with Peter Collins to see how the two compare.

That would be even more ridiculous than doubling them in my opinion as it's just further complications. At least double points is easy to remember! I think the argument in general against it isn't that it gives away too many points or is unfair in any way (it is, but no more than the TS rule). It's just that giving out double points for nothing other than being behind defies sporting logic. It's a question of Speedway's credibility more than anything. Personally, I always found the Tac Sub rule a bit of an embarassment too due to it only being available to the team behind, although at least the substitution concept wasn't as ludicrous as the Joker. In terms of closeness of results there isn't much difference between the two anyway. On the 3 occasions I've been through a programme this year to see what the likely result might have been I have reckoned that on 2 occasions the team that used the TR would have had a better result under the old TS rule and on the other occasion it was the same.

I think it's worded ok Phil, I just did it all in a bit of a rush without reading it properly. It's just inexcusable (copyright Dennis Sigalos, 1983). The TR rule is ridiculous.

I just voted YES by mistake, and meant NO. Is there any way of removing my vote or changing it? I feel dead silly now. The TR rule is ridiculous.

http://www.geocities.com/gam_noticeboard/shay83.html

You should know better than to question our Falcace on 80s speedway, Tigerblade!