Reviresco

I reckon the 'New Feature' on a Thursday night will be linked to the Witches' new Title Sponsor - any news on that yet? So: if it is Truck R Us, it will be truck racing; if it's Jack's Cafe it will be an all day breakfast eating competition; if it's Hintlesham Fisheries it will be an angling competition - or similar. Other than that, it might just be a 'spot the missing rider/s' competition due to all the doubling up/down or, if they can't get the new Team Manager off the golf course, maybe a different fan can take on the role at each home meeting, or with Sarj in the team the fans will be asked to make replacement tapes (sorry Sarj, backing you to have a great season under the Louis' influence). All joking aside, I hope it is a success and well done to the Club for even thinking about engaging the fans.

Well, KB is on the HL List, so that makes him an EL HL for the purposes of team building... Unless the change of race night was simply as a prelude to and an indicator of a fixed EL race night from 2017, agreed on both points Steve and, as you say, the change of night was linked to the signing of a rider rather than anything else. On this basis then, KB should be discounted from the 2016 Stars team and he can be free to take his services elsewhere - Peterborough fans seem keen on him. (I did see that he had an operation back in November to alleviate arm pump, so it looks as if he will be taking this year seriously.)

And how do you propose classifying riders into Grades? From their Average? Didn't the Conference League utilise 'Rider Gradings' (11 down to 2) a decade or so ago which were based on Average, age and experience, but then all teams still had to come in under a combined Grading Limit and had to have 2 x Grade 2's and only 1 x Grade 11? Averages or Grades? Does it make a lot of difference? To provide a reasonable playing field (racing track) some form of 'limit' seems a reasonable method of equalising team strengths and, has been alluded to, has to be better than a return to Rider Control. There's no doubt that Averages in the EL have become skewed and made it more difficult to use them simply to build team strength's up to a combined set limit. but what other method can you employ? Other sports have introduced 'wage caps', but these seem to be open to all sorts of abuse. Personally, I certainly wouldn't want to run speedway under a 'who pays most' wins basis. Apologies - gone off Thread here.

Thanks Steve. So with Batchelor, Schlein, Lambert, Mads & Rose announced, I make that 11.81 points left to recruit a Heat Leader/Second String and a Tier 1 Reserve. If KB is re-signed on his closing 5.87, that still leaves a further 5.94 for the Tier 1 which, imo, would leave the Stars too far away from the 40.50 Limit and must rule out KB then.

Totally agree with you and Iris, Trees. Always enjoyed Pairs meetings and riders who look for their partner in Pairs and Team meetings always receive my seal of approval. Whilst I would prefer a national team based World Pairs event, maybe the advent of this new Pairs format will help attract new sponsors into the sport and bring it in line with other forms of team motor sports. Maybe...

Yes, great old images. Can you tell me where the new stadium has been built in relation to the two other stadia in these pictures, to form the triangle of Belle Vue speedway?

At the end of 1975, Ipswich had Mick Hines moved to Wimbledon and Belle Vue had Soren Sjosten moved to Birmingham for the 1976 season, so Rider Control was in operation then.

Andy, I've probably missed it but has the regular race night been announced yet? If so, this should really be on the home page of the web-site. I also concur about the logo. I appreciate that the Club is pursuing a friendly, community, family feel to it but if you are going to call yourselves the Wightlink Warriors, then the characters on the logo don't fit that at all, imo. Not at all 'Island Warrior' like. The trouble is, individual characters already appear on the merchandising, T shirts, coffee cups, etc, and on individual pages on the web-site, so if you do change the logo, then these would need to be altered too. (I had thought it was odd that there were eight characters on the logo, when speedway teams have seven riders, but I guess you have signed a number eight in George Piper, so fair enough maybe.) Also, there seems to me to be a lot more up to date and relevant information about the Club on your Speedway Portal web-site rather than on the Club's own site. Is it planned to transfer some if not all of that across at some stage? Due to it's unique location, I would've thought that any info on IOW attractions, places to stay, eat, drink, transport links, stadium location, etc. should really be on the Club's web-site and not on the Portal. I do wish you all the best of fortune and am very pleased to see the IOW back on the speedway map.

Australian Rules Football and there will be an 'A' League franchise in 2016 to keep the Roobins Aussie theme going. Alternatively, if the stadium isn't quite finished in time, boomerang throwing competitions and didgeridoo lessons will be held in the open spaces.

How many points do the Stars have available for their last two riders - I haven't a clue what average Mads Korneliussen would start on?

Would expect Richard Lawson to be announced as back riding in the EL for Lakeside in the next couple of weeks.

The Club's website and twitter announced yesterday that ticket prices were being frozen at 2015 levels. Also the statement went on to say that: 'We are currently assessing the fixture clashes involved for Rich, Edward & Kim to ensure we have the maximum availability possible and we hope to announce further rider news after the BSPA meeting next Tuesday.' Does the reference to 'Rich' mean that Richard Lawson has been re-signed for this season, or may be after the fixtures have been assessed or, as usual, have I missed something somewhere? http://www.lakesidehammers.co/vortex-hammers-price-freeze/

It doesn't look as if this has been mentioned on here yet, but the second staging of the International Pre-Season Cup with Wroclaw as the visitors is now scheduled for Friday 18th March and not 20th as originally mentioned: http://www.kingslynnstars.co/2016/01/08/stars-to-open-with-wroclaw-challenge/

Josh Bates winning the 'A' Final of the 2016 Rob Woffinden Classic at Pinjar Park at the weekend: https://www.facebook.com/210176433026/videos/10153323069043027/

Video of the 'A' Final from the 2016 Rob Woffinden Classic held at Pinjar Park at the weekend, featuring WA Champion Daniel Winchester, Josh Bates, Frank Smart and Cameron Heeps: https://www.facebook.com/210176433026/videos/10153323069043027/ Connor Coles and Layne Cupitt also took part in the meeting. Heat 1 (Coles); Heat 3 (Heeps & Cupitt); Heat 4 (Bates): https://www.facebook.com/Quit-Pinjar-Park-Motorcycle-Speedway-210176433026/videos?ref=page_internal

Yah Nice Aas? Surely not...

Dave, there was a song titled 'Speedway Star' on the 'B; side of The Pastels single 'Speeding Motorcycle' which was released in 1991 and both tracks can be found on their 'Truckload of Trouble' compilation album released in 1994. Also on the 'B' side of the single was a track titled '4th Bend'. Both tracks can be found on youtube if you want to remember how they sounded, with 'Speedway Star' being linked to a video of Indycar racing, strangely: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hq_t7Sgogv0

NRGTV cover MX and Supercross in Australia and, as such it was their commentator's (Kevin Williams) first speedway coverage. 'BJ', Brendon Gledhill, has been long involved in speedway Down Under, was Mildura Motorcycle Club's Secretary and is now their Media Publicist and stadium announcer. I don't think it was a serious comment about being Australia's best... It was never going to be super professional standard coverage and to compare it to the highly paid 'pros' at Sky TV is silly. I was just pleased to have the live stream and thankful to NRG for their efforts.

Out of last year's SGP boys, I don't think either Doyle or Holder snr were going to take part this year, but Jason would probably have missed out anyway whilst recovering from his injuries at the Aussie SGP and Chris is on holiday in the States. Batchelor was scheduled to take part in the Series, but broke an upper arm in a MX accident before Christmas.

I think Max Ruml finished 2nd in the 2015 AMA USA National Speedway Championship, behind Billy Janniro and the Eligibility for a Visa application was a Top Four finish, so Max should qualify under this criteria. As you say, Commonwealth or USA riders new to British Speedway were treated as Category 2 which attracted an Assessed Match Average of 7.00 last season, but we know that a number of 'new' Australian riders are coming in this season on an Assessed 5.00, so believe that the Assessed 7.00 has been changed to 5.00 for 2016 and that USA riders will be treated the same as Commonwealth riders.

I don't think the expression 'doubling up / down' was in use back then.

I really hope your wrong Shads. Have always enjoyed my trips to Hoddesdon over the past 40 years or so.

Ahh, ok, sounds likely to me. Thanks.

Thought they got Five in 2016, but happy to be proved wrong. Two in both Round 1 at Kings Lynn and in Round 2 at Munkebo on 7th May and One in Round 4 at Abensberg on 16th May. Maybe there are Five spaces for Australian riders in the SGP Qualifiers - top Four from the Championship and a 'Pick'.

With many riders doubling up / down, it must make it difficult to arrange fixtures for one night let alone consecutive nights and won't have helped to fix up the old style 'tours'. According to the Panthers web-site, the First Draft of PL fixtures has been received and are expected to be finalised this month.