IainB

I remember Jason Gage beating Hans Nielsen once at Peterborough, he brought the house down... Doesn't mean they're going to go on to great things

Can somebody read through these and summarise the relevant points... thanks https://www.pzm.pl/zuzel/regulaminy https://translate.google.co.uk/?hl=en-GB&tab=rT#view=home&op=translate&sl=pl&tl=en Rules.txt

It's the World Champ in the picture Hang on a minute, let's not blow too much smoke up the Poles bottoms... The fact is they have still only produced 3 world champions (ever), have won most of the team cups on their own tracks. even these under 23 (or is it 21) world beating reserves that we see disappear when they get older... where are the reserves of a few years ago now? I don't think, most, including me, are criticising Dave... It's Premier Sports not providing him with a co-commentator to work with. I don't know that I've ever watched any live sport that has been presented with a single commentator... since the 70's

The Speedway on TV issue is a complex one, looking back at the crowds in the early Sky days and it's pretty clear promoters of today would die for those crowds. A lot of "promotions" never promoted a televised event at their track. At the end of the day, for me and many people I suspect, it came down to money. Whenever Sky were at Coventry I never went... because they never reduced their admission, I wasn't going to pay £16 to watch a meeting I was already paying for on Sky, If they'd reduced it to a tenner (and once or twice they did) I would have attended (and I did). When clubs reduced their admission the crowds were generally much more healthy.

Well, I've watched my first 3 PPV matches on Premier Sport and I must say, while I'm more than happy to have some "Live" Speedway to watch, I'm less than happy with the coverage. It reminds me very much of how Eurosport used to be, bordering on amateurish, I wonder if this will be the shape of things to come when/if the British League gets underway on that channel. I know the commentator is active on here so I'll not be too critical but he really needs a co-commentator to work with as even just reading tweets out during the breaks leaves him with nowhere to go other than silence. You'd think that Premier Sport would have taken in enough extra subscription money to warrant a co-commentator. I also realise there were no adverts in any of the matches over the weekend, so surely that's even more reason for a co-commentator. The commentator doesn't seem to have done his homework on the intricacies of the Polish League either, with lack of knowledge of the helmet covers, league points, tacticals, rider numbering (what's that all about!!) etc. He's certainly more knowledgeable than that 5-1er, 3-3er guy they were using last year for some matches but I do feel he doesn't inject much excitement into his commentary, sounds more like a cricket commentary... but that's just my personal preference/opinion. Missing heat 1 of the 1st match yesterday while they're playing promos is amateurish and unforgivable. Having watched some of the Free Sport output last year I've become well used to not seeing the last few heats of a meeting, so I was well prepared for it and recorded the whole channel for the night! As things stand I can't see myself renewing my subscription beyond this season should live British Speedway resume next year.

Like I said... better to watch delayed, unless you like long silences

During this time of lock down I've been listening to a lot of excellent Podcasts, where a number of riders have been telling stories of their careers. It's been great listening to some of their anecdotes at length, as opposed to a mid meeting interview, or a PR friendly interview in the Speedway Star. I don't know if I'm just naive but a thread that seems to run through a lot of them are the shady people and dealings that go on in the sport that a lot of us have no idea about. The Sean Wilson, Rick Miller and Bobby Schwartz podcasts have been very entertaining. Anyway the ones I've been listening to are provided by: Humans of Speedway Tatum & Peason Talk Speedway The Speedway Podcast Are there any others I wonder?

"The Axeman" as nobody called him... Except for Peter Yorke

Haven't they got that roof on yet? I thought that was the reason why it closed... at least that was the story we were being fed at the time

You could try starting up a Just Giving page

I think you can subscribe to the online Premier Player, whether the rights extends to the US or not I don't know... you may also need VPN

I tend to watch on Live/Delay anyway... a bit like the F1, maybe give them half an hour start and FF through all the filler and hope to end at about the same time

probably better... as from what I've seen in the past they do tend to have looooong delays for track grades etc. and as there's no presenting team there's no filler... saves me fast forwarding through it all

The can of worms is now open...

Ekstraliga being shown live on Premier Sports @ £9.99 a month for 6 month contract... think I may have a punt for that price, especially as I've spent £0.00 on Speedway so far this year!

well he certainly shows a tremendous lack of empathy with his "victims"

And the relevance to Mr Garrity?

I listened through earbuds to cut away background noise... it's well worth a listen

Unfortunately that's what Sean sounds like... try playing it at half speed, it then makes perfect sense Seriously though, I thought the Sean Wilson podcast was very insightful

Monday April 27, 2020 BRITISH Speedway is unlikely to resume behind closed doors. Rob Godfrey, chairman of the British Speedway Promoters Ltd, has stated the financial impact of no fans makes meetings unviable. Poland’s top league look set to start their season on June 12 with no spectators – but they have record levels of revenue from TV and sponsorship deals. Godfrey said: “As a sport in the UK under the current financial structure it’s not possible for us to run behind closed doors. “The only way it could happen is if revenue came in to underpin it, but right now we cannot see it happening so all talk of this is irrelevant.” https://www.speedwaygb.co.uk/news.php?extend.38043

Probably something for a different thread, but it amazes me watching back through clips, especially in this country, of the high throughput of riders who never really "make it" and when I say make it I mean hold down a regular spot in the main body of a team. I don't know how Speedway compares to other sports for throughput of talent but you only have to have a look through the speedway updates site from a few years ago to see the amount of riders who don't "make it"

So that's what happens after a meeting is rained off and we've all left the stadium... thought it was quite a good tune too

Didn't he ride for a couple of years for Bradford? And wasn't he a Motocross rider?

I hope the bottles are used with Morris Lubricants

Thanks for the link... Shame Tai let himself down (again) with his language, Suzi didn't seem that impressed... he still shows a bit of immaturity at times