uk_martin

The Vissing situation was foreseen by many people in the pre-season chat in the forums. With SO long being spent "checking fixture lists" prior to the signing, I can only conclude that this is no accident. And as for what I'd have done differently, I'd have made sure that some last year's riders were paid in full and on time so that they weren't in such a hurry to leave the club. Maybe then, some more options would have been available to choose from. As for Ellisgate, again, plenty of people have expressed their grievances on here. No need to repeat it all again.

Well, quite...guests-a-go-go. And for the foreseeable future too. It seems that the Brummies fans were conned over the Ellisgate affair, and this "MissingVissinggate" is a blatant attempt to con the rest of the league, not to mention the fans. Some may consider it to be "cute" management, but to me a con is a con.

What would you expect from a commentator, a fan and a couple of sponsors? Theirs is the money, Laurence Rogers' is the experience, knowledge and expertise that they rely on. What could possibly go wrong?

Scored a maximum for Stal Gorzów u24 team the other week in Poland too. Slightly better opposition there than Roynon & Pearson.

Still got road works, but little in the way of delays....OR...you can now travel by train and use Perry Barr's shiny, brand-new train station Well, brand new it is, but shiny it isn't. Some genius designer decided that "dirty rusty" is the new black, and erm, well, the locals aren't amused. No doubt it will one day become a "future classic" of it's type...possibly? But anyway, rail services to Perry Barr are now available again.

Don't worry about the bandwidth, with the 3 withdrawn riders, only 2 riders in Heat 8 and 4 of the remaining races only featuring 3 riders, I'm sure it will cope. :-o Ironic that it's at Edinburgh, isn't it? Home of the great Train Robber who, in his role as BSPA Chairman, instructed the Birmingham Brummies web site to be closed down, apparently because it was too bandwidth hungry, and made the BSPA servers struggle, back in 2013.

One for all other team managers to make a note of, when booking a guest. He's just shrunk his market value immensely.

Yep. Yep Laurence Rogers, the genial team manager... I read somewhere that James Shanes mows Rogers's lawn for him so there's obviously some favouritism going on, guaranteeing his favourite lawn mower extra rides to give him a decent pay day at the clubs expense rather than paying a decent wage out of his own pocket for cutting the grass.

British Speedway. The recycle bin for those who fail to make it elsewhere Out of interest, does the BSPZzz impose any conditions on Polish riders who sign for British teams? And what assessed averages would those Polish juniors who fail to make the cut in Poland be given, bearing in mind that the reason they didn't make it was that they are not very good?

You don't need to tell anyone at Birmingham or Plymouth that. It's the fantasist clamouring for the reopening of Bradford, Coventry, Eastbourne, Reading, Swindon etc. who need convincing.

After the Commonwealth Games, when all the building work is finished and all the temporary workers have gone home, watch the prices at that Travelodge tumble.

Maybe he/she is still checking his/her fixture list... but don't worry, there are plenty of irons in the fire, even though getting the 4 partners together was the hardest winter's work ever.

To be slightly pedantic, 1 woman and 3 blokes...but as Lawrence Rogers ISN'T one of the 4-person ownership consortium, I'm left wondering who out of the 4 does have speedway promoting experience. Rogers put the consortium together but didn't invest any of his own money into buying into a share of the consortium. He's got promotion and speedway management experience and it would appear he's got a salaried position in the company. If, woe betide, all goes belly up, it won't be Rogers who loses his house.

You don't have Hairy Trussell, (or something like that) in mind now do you? He could set up a company (call it AmbuSpeed International Ltd, maybe?) and as you say, trouser a load of money for himself, before putting the company into liquidation.

£8 reduction off readmission price of a future meeting according to BSPZzzz regulations. So the net cost to fans last night was £5 per race. Feel sorry for the Berwick fans for such a wasted journey.

Annoying when that happens, especially after the Redcar meeting in June 2021 had to be abandoned for the same reason. Lessons not being learned.

GiveusaB must be one of the few remaining fans below pension age who spends the day focused on the job that they get paid to do, and not spend all day every day just staring out of windows. A strange concept for some speedway fans to understand, perhaps, but someone has to keep the economy ticking over.

RIP Nigel Pearson

Any more references to the second coming of Darcy Ward are vastly premature. So how about we leave the kid alone to develop at his own pace and not put him under any more pressure? Maybe that way he will develop into a decent rider rather than just burning out too soon.

Average race time then about 65 seconds? £18 for 10 races = £1.80 per race. Divided by 65 = 2.77 pence per second of track "action". Alternatively, for the 4 overtakes that were not attributable to bike failures, that's £4.50 per overtake. Bargain! So, who's eating their words now? Who'd want to be a weather forecaster? Yep, it certainly was a night like no other...no getting away from that. It's almost a good thing that the crowd was "unspectacular" as at least if someone does come for their first time in weeks to come, they have a chance of picking up a better impression of the sport than tonight would have given, and may come again.

I live in Perry Barr, and we don't get the Chronicle here any more. We used to, I think, years ago, but spam newspapers here are a thing of the past. Shame really, I could do with a regular supply of old newspapers for when I need one to protect surfaces when I'm decorating etc.

Does anyone know whether this streaming malarkey is meant to be a commercial concern, or a social service?

Be interesting to see what CMA's Crang and Thomson attained in their illustrious Bees careers.

Doesn't anyone do what Ivan Mauger used to do, to keep a book and write down for each track what his best bike settings were, what gear ratios, carburation settings, timings were etc? So that when he re-visited a track he'd be as good in his first race as he was after his last race last time. Obviously, he'd adjust a bit for conditions on the day, but at least he had a good basis to start with. I mean, don't people do that these days? Or is it all "rule of thumb", and "well, let's see if this works"? And as for Harris's quoted reasons..."fuel problems" can someone please explain to the lay person, what problems are incurred in a fuel system where only methanol is permitted? It's not like the mix between methanol and additives was wrong, is it? You don't get a build-up of limescale in the pipes, do you? Was it rust or dirt in the system? In which case why? Aren't things kept clean?

Beware! Dads Army have got a whole platoon stationed on the first bend. Mess with them at your peril