cyclone

First of all Tigers thoroughly deserved their victory, with both sides throwing away points to each other. Must admit the racing was mainly processional, apart from when riders got into problems on some areas of the track. Hopefully the track preparation will improve as the surface recovers from the weather ravages of the opening month, otherwise they need to bring back Alan Bridgett pronto. Even the performance of the referee, Stuart Wilson, was like the Monarchs, below par, when he correctly stopped ht 10 when third placed Vissing fell on bend 3 and fourth placed Starke laid down. However obviously he is unaware of the new ruling that for the re-run, Starke should have started on 15m in such circumstances. Whilst I recognise that it's early days, the abject performances of Joel Andersson so far, even for a newcomer, is a cause for concern. By all means give him 4 home & 4 away in Official fixtures, but if there is no significant improvement, then let's seek someone else (Kasper Lykke Nielsen or Frederik Jacobsen or Oleg Mikhailov or Patrick Hansen?) as prolonging the agony will do no favours for the rider or the fans. To end on a positive note, rather than slit my wrists now , Max Ruml impressed again with a further improved performance.

Hard to tell how the Monarchs will perform as the 3/4 of Mark Riss & Joel Andersson appear to be the possible Achilles Heel, given their starting averages are both less than Worky's now injured Campton. BDW could well be a potential matchwinner for the Comets, all of whom, apart from Bickley, have had more track time at Armadale than Ruml & Andersson, with the latter possibly still feeling the after effects of his horrendous ht 14 crash last Friday.

Are they affiliated to the Freemasons by any chance?

I have in my collection a programme for Hamburg Motordrome which I reckon is 15th September, 1929 & the first name on the list of riders is Ginger Lees.

On the International Forum, I noticed Racers & Royals has listed Chris Harris at no.5 in the Pila side to race at Rybnik on Saturday

No they haven't - ask Richie Worrall!

Thanks , see it now but it's not prominently displayed and you have to dig down to find it. Also noted that there's a 50p booking fee per transaction, so if only purchasing 1 adult ticket online, the total cost will be £18.

Cannot find PATG prices listed on Official website, mind you if they're the highest in the UK, this might be intended. They've also bumped the progy price up from £2.80 to three quid - imo this is too expensive & will probably encourage more to bring their own pre-printed score sheets. Think whoever is responsible is trying to "persuade" occasional punters to book online/obtain a blue card instead. Also noticed that Sam Masters is still listed as Team Captain under club info. - tut tut.

Saw him in action at Sittingbourne in September and was very impressed by him. Has a classic effortless style and thought he would have been snapped up by Scunny for their no.7 this Season. Having also seen JPB riding, personally I would have chosen JT ahead of him. Think the Tigs have just improved their prospects for 2018 with this signing.

Time for a reality check for those who believe that noise is not a problem in the environment that Speedway operates in the UK. If some believe that the background noise is such an intrinsic factor in the Sport, then if Speedway is to continue in areas with residential housing nearby, the only option to keep both the sound addicts and the local residents happy would be to build/alter stadia to be totally enclosed with all-encompassing roofs. This would probably be too costly to do in the first place, but would have the added bonus of preventing cancellations due to rain. The other alternative is that Speedway circuits have to relocate to remote sites, and assuming there is no protected wildlife in the vicinity. If this was the case, then I wonder how a viable support could be attracted to travel to such locations. Continuing to ignore other alternatives, such as quieter bikes, is more likely to the last nail in the coffin, if we wish to retain the Sport within, or near to population centers.

It's the crowd that should create both the level of atmosphere & noise in a stadium, rather than relying on an artificial surrounding created by exhausts which travels well outside the venue. Major sports such as football can create plenty atmosphere without relying upon artificial means of noise. In fact if we had quiet bikes, the comments shouted from the terraces could enhance the atmosphere, rather than be drowned out by the noise from the bikes.

Who said they might like it? If you had bothered to properly read what I stated namely """If electric bikes can match or better the level entertainment of the current conventional Speedway". My point was that it's what we watch that is important, not the background noise, which causes more problems with the surrounding neighborhood for existing and proposed tracks. So if a form of Speedway engine/silencer was developed that minimised noise but did not impact on the quality of racing, would you still be against it? I am aware that electric speedway bikes have not so far matched conventional machines, but they are a far quieter alternative. Still if it's the noise that turns you on, turn your deaf aid up a bit more

The main reason I watch Speedway is the visual spectacle, not the background noise. As far as noise is concerned I'm sure the riders and their pit crews would welcome having to dispense with ear defenders when warming up the bikes. If electric bikes can match or better the level entertainment of the current conventional Speedway, and given the removal of one of the main sources of objection by NIMBYs, namely excessive noise, then it make sense to go down this route, unless of course if you still yearn for the reintroduction of dynosaurs

Although this subject has been briefly discussed in the Edinburgh 2018 thread, as this does not relate to actual team building, and in view of its long term importance to the future existence of The Monarchs, I have therefore created this new topic on this specific subject. Local Armadale Cllr Stuart Borrowman on Facebook on 28 January at 07:19 posted the following:- Council officials are minded to approve the application for 2.7ha of housing at Armadale Stadium. Officers say the capacity issues at Armadale PS(Primary School) have eased and the stadium is not classified by SportScotland as an outdoor sports facility and "doesn't have the appearance or function of open space." However Contact has been made with sportscotland on this issue and their response was :- “sportscotland is aware of the planning application and the potential loss of this facility. We do appreciate that this would impact on the current users of this facility, however sportscotland is not a statutory consultee in this instance, and therefore has no formal remit to comment on the planning application. We don’t define what is or is not a stadium, that is done by planning legislation, sportscotland don’t have a recognition criteria for stadia.” Furthermore on sportscotland website the Master List of Sporting Activities and Governing Bodies Recognised by the Sports Councils ( https://sportscotland.org.uk/media/2846/list-of-uk-recognised-ngbs-and-sport-list-october-2017.pdf ) at the bottom of page 3, Speedway is recognised by sportscotland under the auspices of the Scottish Auto Cycle Union As the above conflicts with Councillor Borrowman’s public statement re sportscotland, perhaps resident West Lothian Speedway fans could either contact both Mr Borrowman and West Lothian Planning Department, or their local Councillor, to ascertain the source of the misleading statement.

On the Edinburgh Facebook, it appears Rod Godfrey has acknowledged the rule allowing discretion has never been applied since the very unfortunate Ty Proctor/Sheffield affair of 2015, and because immigration is such a major and important topic, needing the qualifying position to be clear and not varying. The discretionary rule should no longer be there (i.e. on the BSPA website) and will be removed. As I personally do not agree with discretionary rules, agree with it's removal and recognise that "clerical oversights" can occur. What is unsatisfactory is that this discretionary exemption issue was raised by both the AMA & Edinburgh at least three months ago and apparently the above explanation has only been provided now. Thus the AMA & Edinburgh could have been spared unnecessarily wasting their time over the interim period if the aforementioned explanation and the expunging of the discretionary rule from http://www.speedwaygb.co./sponsoredmigrantspolicy had been actioned when first raised. (the Section for consideration of applications for discretionary endorsements is still there btw ! ). In Edinburgh's case they could have been exploring alternative signing avenues earlier.

Different environment when originally introduced as there was a larger pool of UK talent in the second tier of racing. Kennett & Nicholls would still not have been eligible as a) they can hardly now be described as "up and coming", and if iirc, b ) riders could only double up from their current second tier team to a top tier side, not double down from a current top tier side to a second tier team.

You've missed the point, the ruling does not exclusively apply to UK citizens.

Existing non British riders on lower 2017 PL averages than Nicholls, such a Fricke, Bellego, Chris Holder, & Tungate are also barred from doubling-up, so your suggestion that the ruling discriminates against British riders is invalid.

It's not as if Nicholls & Kennett are to be unemployed in 2018, and as things stand, some 2017 double uppers such as Jack Smith, Ricky Wells, Eric Riss will not be riding in both the PL &CL this Season. The statement on the BSPA website justifying the restriction on doubling UP " in order to gain more control of the doubling-up situation and begin steps to reduce the prospect of Premiership and Championship clubs looking too similar" seems reasonable. Allowing those who already double-upped in 2017 to continue to do so, also seems fair - a bit like the proposed residency criteria for Brexit eh And to remind all the "Brits First" brigade, it's not only Nicholls & Kennett that are prevented from doubling-up, so are the likes of Max Fricke, Rohan Tungate, Hans Andersen, and David Bellego etc.

Appears you can appeal according to what John Campbell posted on the Edinburgh website:- "As we attempted to leave no stone unturned in trying to get the endorsement, my co-promoter Alex even phoned UK Visa and Immigration and their official confirmed that Luke's situation seemed to fall exactly in line with the BSPA procedure, fulfilling both of the criteria for a discretionary endorsement." Personally, I do not favour any discretionary changes being made once the rules are established, and I can understand that if Monarchs were successful, then it might be seen as favouritism, whilst the likes of Lakeside were denied their initially submitted Championship GSAs for Wajtknecht & Morley. Likewise for the MC/BSPA to remain consistent, I would expect them to maintain their bar on Premier riders who do not already have a 2017 Championship GSA and whose 2017 Premier GSA is above 6.00. In essence the likes of Nicholls & Kennett should not suddenly become eligible to sign for any Championship side now, including Newcastle & Peterborough of course

It has been suggested that any Speedway Supporters resident in West Lothian should try and lobby their local councilors now, before the planning application is voted on. It is unlikely that the Planning Officials, who are recommending approval, will have made the councilors fully aware of the opposition viewpoint.

I cannot understand the indignation on Facebook of Scott Frame (who although a co-presenter of EM TV, is not an official representative of Edinburgh Speedway), towards Glasgow publicly criticising Sports Scotland for not recognising Armadale Stadium, home to Edinburgh, as “an outdoor sport facility”. He appears to believe that this issue should be initially publicised by the Edinburgh Promotion and seems to infer that Tigers motives are more to do with themselves getting good publicity, which I consider is rubbish! Has he considered that the Edinburgh Promotion might be inhibited from entering the public fray on this issue for fear of damaging their existing relationship with their current landlord, who in effect, holds the Sword of Damocles over them? I get the feeling that Mr Frame, who does quite a bit PR on Speedway, is really a bit miffed that another colleague, namely Phil Lanning, has taken the publicity initiative here. Anyway, I welcome the Tigers support on the matter and hope that they ignore the pettiness of SF, as I reckon the vast majority of Edinburgh fans will appreciate Ian Beattie's statement

No! Part of the attraction of the CL is the arrival of young Aussies with potential to progress to greater things. Would the likes of Doyle, Fricke, Tungate, Masters, etc. have ever graced the CL if there was such a restriction in place when they arrived as promising raw youngsters? As usual with some "Brits First" posters on here, they claim that our Antipodean friends are taking the bread out of the mouths of mediocre locals. Fact is that in 2017 this "deluge" of young Aussie invaders totaled one, yes one!, namely Josh Pickering whose performances home & away were appreciated by Monarchs fans. As the visa entrance criteria has already been reduced from top 4 to 3 in State Titles, which as things stand , will prevent new Oz U-21 Champ, Jaimon Lidsey from appearing here in 2018, I would prefer that the previous quota was reinstated, which I believe, would allow Lidsey to be considered.

First of all we are discussing a CL club here and no one is advocating that the NL should allow overseas riders to participate in their league. At Edinburgh, the supporters have had very few problems with the overseas guys recruited in terms of commitment. Indeed in 2016 when we ran our final home match, due to previous postponements, on 21st October , a break of 3 weeks since our last actual race meeting, our 3 Germans traveled back to honour their commitment. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of a certain English team member who threw a sickie, but was well enough to attend a social function at his EL club on the same night! Unlike the overseas riders who are prepared to commute here, we have great difficulty in attracting decent English prospects to sign on for us, usually citing our base as being too far for them to travel. So what are we supposed to do, just employ any Brit who is willing to come, irrespective of their ability? Well current & potential local supporters up here would soon lose interest if we were compelled to track cannon fodder in the name of keeping all British riders in a job. Oh and btw, our foreign guys do socialise after the meeting and our promising Aussie, Josh Pickering, stayed within a couple hundred yards of the Stadium with a local family.

So you are unable to provide historical evidence of numerous, if any, foreign newcomers achieving a 7 pt CL GSA in their maiden Season, yet you still persist in claiming that they are "1.8 cheaper in than they should be in the first place". Is it the 1.3 conversion factor that you are unhappy with also? If not, then surely foreign newcomers such as Kasper Andersen recruited by King's Lynn should start on 5.38 instead of 4.00, in order to justify your view that overseas newcomers to the CL begin on 7.00? If the 5.38 PL start figure had been implemented, it might have meant that the likes of Josh Auty would still be at King's Lynn, and who knows, Buster might have been able to accommodate the likes of Jacobs or Perks also IMO the previous 7.00 point starting GSA for overseas newcomers in the PL was correctly reduced, based on the data from previous Seasons, something you wish to ignore in justifying you're so called "ringers" argument.