Paulco

So the Monarchs bring a 14 point lead along the M8 from Smugville . Not sure if you still get the big spring in the plank of wood for winning this , or a blow up model with a strange facial expression . Anyway 14 points to peg back is doable if we have blown all the cobwebs away after our opening two fixtures . These were the line ups in Smugville last night , so i presume we'll stick to it . Glasgow Smugbusters Tigers 1 Kevin Wolbert 2 Mark Lemon 3 Theo " thank god i'm a Tiger again " Pijper 4 Dimitri Berge 5 Rusty Harrison 6 Kasper Lykke Nielsen 7 Anders Thomsen THEM 1 The Blessed Cookie 2 Samantha Fox 3 The Golden Child 4 Desperate Deek 5 Sam " i guested for the Tigers once "Masters 6 Justin " so did i " Sedgmen 7 The lesser Worrall Presumably the ref will either be the Grand Monarch or his apprentice and hopefully we do what we did last night and gave all the riders , even Samantha , their programmed rides . Prediction , Glasgow 60 THEM 30 .

With the temperature as it was , you never heard many complaints . But to be fair to the Grand Monarch , there was no decisions that had to be made in the Monarchs favour and the meeting was sped through at a brisk pace , and that didn't detract any from the entertainment .

Early forecast promises a dry day , but it is the speedway season . And we dont do micro climates we have sun offs remember

Decent sized crowd as well tonight , with a fair few from Glasgow there . Hope it gets reciprocated on Sunday . Edinburgh's air fence does look mightily impressive

Berge looked a bit wild in his opening ride , before he eventually fell . Was more tentative after that . Difficult place to make your debut . We'll see more from him on bigger tracks

Lemon was unfortunate when he got into a bit of a fankle when we were on a 5-1 , seemed to get to close to it . But we got gifted a 5-1 later on when Sedgmen's chain seemed to snap , so that evened things . Lykke and Thomsen gives us real hope in the early weeks till Berge drops to reseve

Good post George , a thoroughly entertaining meeting for a pre season friendly

We heard tonight that it will be r/r for Wells and Chris Schraam in for Ashley Morris . This doubling up or down whatever it is , is going to be troublesome .

Was not too bad a pipe opener i thought , some really good races there . The four reserves on show gave enough cause for optimism for both sides . The two rookies , Fox and Berge , struggled a bit , but it's early days for both of them . But both teams can take a bit of heart out of tonight's showing .

The cold was gauranteed , just hope this heavy rain is just here and not in Smugville

Oh well here's the first - it's raining here in the west , what's it like at Armadale ? - of the season . No doubt to be answered by " Armadale has it's own micro climate so nobody knows "

24 hours till the action through in Smugville commences , bring it on

Miners lamp for filling programme purposes all ready , raring to go now , c'mon the Stripes

No , Workington on Saturday The Monarchs look mince and i predict they'll be using a tactical before heat 8 on Friday

first away win of the season

Are folk expecting this Brady Kurtz to be some sort of Darcy Ward ? Not many new Aussies reach much more than their 5 point average . Even the Golden Child at the dump only reached 5.82 last year

While riding for Glasgow at Workington last season , he looked as if he'd never seen the place before

Last season it did look as if his head had gone . Would do alright in some meetings , then get pitched into heat 15 and would run a bad last . Was capable of some stirring rides , beat the blessed Cookie round the dump , then would get trounced by a reserve in his next race . The British Final , where he looked desperately out of his depth , seemed to drain whatever confidence he had left and he threw in the towel not long after . To be honest , i dont see clubs queuing up to sign him if he does make a comeback .

Considering our track has become a bit of a gaters paradise in recent years , that doesn't augur well for his chances .

On our away trips the war cry had to wait till heat 8 when Super Steve was on a taccy

They've always been a pain at Owlerton .

So that's why he quit

Do you actually know what the Premier Shield is Blobby ?

I remember Backtrack magazine doing a piece on this a couple of years back , it really is incredible we're still going considering the amount of times we've had to upsticks and move house . I was 9 when my Dad first took me to the White City track in 1968 , which turned out to be the final season there as it made way for the M8 motorway . I actually thought i was going to the football first time i went as it wasn't too far from Glasgow Rangers' ground . Dont really remember too much about it , apart from finding a ten shilling note on the ground one night and my father taking care of it for me , and a spectacular crash between Glasgow's Bo Josefsson and Edinburgh's George Hunter when the two locked together coming up the home straight and demolishing the starting gate . It was Hampden Park next , a couple of thousand of us crammed into the main stand and the rest of the huge stadium empty , hardly condusive to atmospheric speedway . Charlie Monk and Jim McMillan were my heroes in those days , though again memories are sketchy . The sad death on track of SveIn Kassa , when he clipped Martin Ashby's back wheel and shot up into the air , is sadly one of the vivid ones . Old Jimmy Beaton wanting to fight anyone who remotely went near Bobby on track , opposition or team mates , didnt matter which haha . And a Nordic - British final where Ivan Mauger rode with a plaster cast on his foot being the ones that immediately spring to mind . Coatbridge next , what a dump but i loved the place . The roof on the back straight terrace had more holes than actual roof and you got soaked when it rained , the pee used to flow out of the door of the lavvys , but the track was amazing . Huge scary bankings were awesome . One night it staged a Scotland v Norway test match , the pipe band were strutting their stuff on track before the meeting , shame the referee never noticed them before sending the riders out for heat 1 and forced them to scatter ...........or maybe he did . Blantyre 1 was a culture shock after Coatbridge , after the huge bankings it was a tight wee trick track . Though i grew to love the place and watch in awe at Steve Lawson rule supreme around it . Even Bruce Penhall had to play second fiddle to God round there . Blantyre 2 was an awful place , D shaped track , crap teams apart from Super Steve , and a sad eviction which saw us trying to see the season out at Workington . Even only charging one pound on the supporters bus couldn't tempt folk to make the journey , and changing the name to Workington Tigers couldn't tempt the locals to go . So we were out of the league . But we re-emerged at Shawfield the following year , and the glory part of Glasgow's history was about to begin . The National Trophy success of 1990 was the springboard to unprecedented glory . KO Cup runners up to the mighty Arena Essex side after a replay in 1991 , the only 2nd tier side to eliminate a top flight club in 1992's inter league cup , what an atmosphere as we won a heat 15 decider against Cradley Heath . Robert Nagy winning the 1992 Div 2 Riders Championship at Coventry after a shambolic series of run offs against Mick Poole . And then League and Cup double success in 93 and 94 . 95 saw us nearly fold again as the ill conceived league amalgamation crippled us . 96 saw us without a team and Edinburgh without a track , so the Scottish Monarchs was born . Another daft idea that saw Monarchs fans refusing to watch their team at Glasgow and us turning up to cheer the opposition . Not a great success , but it did keep speedway in Scotland alive . But 97 saw us back , but only for another couple of seasons at Shawfield , before 99 saw us open at our present home of Ashfield . A couple of financial scares , a couple of attempts by residents and planners to force us out , another few pieces of silverware , and we're still going . By the skin of our teeth a few times , but we seem to be speedway's great survivors .

Can we get a proper growling Tiger back on the racejacket this season please . That Red Revolution thing we had last year , looked like it was hiding behind the couch . No wonder we were bottom of the league .