IainB

Seems strange that they've not done a double header with this, an SWC and a SGP round 🤷‍♂️

We got some lovely shots of the ground though 😂

Not good enough! You should resign! I'm afraid we're going to need to destroy your life... it is 2026 afterall 😉

Reading that article it seems that they convert the stadium for a "summer season" including rock concerts and other event's so that "conversion cost" could be spread with other events during the summer and wouldn't be borne by Speedway alone maybe? It does sound like a non-starter though

Surely, it's simple economics with the East Stand, with back of the fag packet workings if the East Stand holds 2,000 and costs £500,000 that adds £25 per ticket to a crowd of 6,500 per night, if it's run over 1 night, £50, that means my South Stand ticket this year would have been more like £100 instead of the £64.50 it actually was. When my last Cardiff ticket cost me £23 and I can go to any meeting at the NSS and watch Speedway of the highest standard for £25 do I want to pay £100 to watch a GP round, possibly in the rain, in the slums of Manchester (😉) with riders who can't even be @rsed to acknowledge the crowd 🤔

It's almost the perfect venue, it's the right shape for starters, it's in London, placed in a better location than Wembley, really easy to get to, with a lower capacity than Wembley & Cardiff. The reasons why not, there's only 14 operational tracks in the UK these days, when BSI took the "gamble" of taking the British GP to Cardiff in 2001 there were at least 24 operational tracks in the UK. Brandon was selling out at about 12,000 (with a lot of Poles attending) and the move to Cardiff really did spark a boom in the whole GP series with more rounds being introduced and also rounds being held in "destination" cities, there'd be no Copenhagen, Ullevi, Stockholm, Warsaw etc without Cardiff but they're all gone now. Maybe they need to go backwards in order to move forwards and reduce the number of rounds back to 6 or 7 at more prestige city destinations... oh and there's no roof 😁

The talent pool was spread much wider in those days thanks to the number of tracks, so if you did have talent, it was much easier to achieve a higher average. Now with only 6 teams in the top league that "talent" is now much more compacted meaning it's far harder to achieve such an average as Lee did and also unfortunately many more of the riders in today's field will never get anywhere near a career out of the sport.

He's not ready to be a Premiership number 1, he's averaging 6.49 this season but bizarrely his GSA has increased from 7.05 to 7.49! Musielak averaging 8, rolling GSA 6.40 Something ain't right with the way they're working these averages out!

23 races done in 2 hours at Manchester on Friday and Saturday (with riders using a new tyre for every race)... couldn't believe they didn't have a kids race though 😉

They weren't in the BSN app either

Just the 35 minutes to run the last 2 races, including a 20 minute gap between heat 20 and the semi 👏 Mind, the crowd were right royally entertained with a kids race, the riders picking their gates, before the semi only, something the GP series kicked into touch about 20 years ago... and a full rendition of The Final Countdown 👌 Well done to Coops, and (through gritted teeth 😬) Wayne Jarvis for making the correct decision to award the final. And for those that weren't counting, the word "tassels" was disappointingly only said the 6 times 😁

I don't think it is though without the East Stand, isn't that why they're held back to back? Mind you, weren't Cardiff and Manchester both originally on the calendar for last year? I dread to think what the Manchester ticket prices would have been if it were a stand alone GP.

What was Hodder excluded for there, officially? Surely it could have only been for unfair riding?

From 20 years ago: 01 Edward Kennett 3, 2, 1, 1, 1 =8 02 Joel Parsons Fx, 0, 2, 1, 2 =5 03 Ben Barker 1, 0, 0, 2, 2 =5 04 Ben Wilson 2, 3, 3, 3, 3 =14 WINNER 05 Richie Dennis 3, 1, 1, 1, 0 =6 06 Jamie Courtney 1, 1, 2, 0, 0 =4 07 Joshua Auty 2, 1, 0, 2, 1 =6 08 Luke Bowen 0, 1, 1, fex, - =2 09 James Brundle 1, 0, 2, 1, 3 =7 10 James Wright 2, 2, 1, 3, 2 =10 11 Lewis Bridger 3, 3, 3, 2, 2 =13 THIRD 12 Benji Compton 0, 2, 0, fex, 1 =3 13 Daniel King 3, 3, 2, 3, 3 =14 SECOND 14 Jason King M, 3, 3, 3, 1 =10 15 Steve Boxall 2, 2, 3, 2, 3 =12 FOURTH 16 Simon Lambert 1, 0, 0, 0, 0 =1 Reserves: 17 Robert Mear 0 18 Ben Hopwood frem 10 years ago: 1. Oliver Greenwood (Buxton) - 2,2,1,2,1 = 8 2. Danny Phillips (Newcastle/Stoke) - 1,0,1,2,F = 4 3. Josh Bates (Coventry/Sheffield) - 3,2,3,3,FX = 11 4. Alfie Bowtell (Mildenhall) - 0,1,0,0,0 = 1 5. James Shanes (Kent) - 2,1,2,FX,2 = 7 6. Robert Lambert (King's Lynn/Newcastle) - 3,3,3,3,3 = 15 7. Nathan Greaves (Sheffield/King's Lynn) - 1,0,3,3,2 = 9 8. Josh Bailey (Scunthorpe/King's Lynn) - 0,2,0,1,M/(BB - 0) = 3 9. Jack Parkinson-Blackburn (Birmingham) - 1,3,2,2,3 = 11 10. Zach Wajtknecht (Somerset/Birmingham) - 3,1,1,2,2 = 9 11. Adam Ellis (Poole/Eastbourne) - 2,3,2,3,3 = 13 12. Danno Verge (Kent) - 0,0,0,1,1 = 2 13. Ellis Perks (Plymouth/Eastbourne) - EX/T(LC-1),0,2,FX,2 = 4 14. Jack Smith (Birmingham) - 2,2,1,EX/2mins(BB-0),1 = 6 15. Max Clegg (Wolverhampton/Edinburgh/Cradley Heath) - 3,1,3,1,3 = 11 16. Danyon Hume (Birmingham) - 0,3,0,1,1 = 5 17. Liam Carr (Berwick/Coventry) - 1 = 1 18. Ben Basford (Cradley Heath) - 0 , 0 = 0

I sometimes wonder whether the commentators are watching the same meeting as I am, how could you not notice there aren't 4 riders at the tapes 🤷‍♂️

They just said everything should be working now and with the new app you can watch it from the beginning while it's still running live. Problem seemed to be with people watching through the website... the apps were okay.

They just announced they are aware there is a problem and are trying to fix it.

Fortunately you're not missing much yet in terms of entertainment.

Loads of people complaining about the issue already on FB

You'll never make the end anyway with 17% battery!

How annoying... they've spelt apologise incorrectly! Get on to Facebook and let them know

Are you using the new app?

It's running

Captain Clipboard in da house!

Agreed, they weren't GP standard at the time though, Bewley was awarded a GP place ahead of others who finished ahead of him in the previous years GP Challenge... and Holder didn't make that GP Challenge at all, they both rose to the challenge (forgive pun) and they had a few years of experience (internationally) under their belts. DJ Woffy was totally out of his depth first time around in the GP's