IainB

Like when Crabby used to remonstrate with the ref using the phone in front of the stand at Stoke... that was brilliant to watch

I think if Wolves was any bigger it probably wouldn't work, there's no doubt it's a technical trick track but I have seen some cracking racing there.

Rockerfeller! There's so much I could say about this, I thinks it's a rather simplistic view and an analogy that can't be made... but to keep up the analogy... Imagine this restaurant you own is in a state of disrepair, the paint is peeling off the walls and you're ankle deep in p155 when you go to the toilet but people still keep coming because at heart the food is so damn good but then you are told by the council you can only open on Monday and Wednesday nights because that's what all of the other restaurants in the area have agreed even if you didn't and then all of a sudden one night the chef doesn't turn up because he's working at a restaurant down the road but it's ok because the council have arranged for one of the burger flippers at the local maccies to be sent in his place... but hang on this isn't a one off, it keeps happening, a lot of your customers stop coming but some continue to do so, you haven't changed your prices, you're still charging restaurant prices for fast food. One night you go out and ask one of the customers tucking into his Big Ace and ask him why does he keep coming, because I remember how good it can be here and occasionally it still is he replies. I'll go and ask some customers that used to come you think to yourself, only you step outside your restaurant and can't find any of them, they're all doing something else now. At this point you send the burger flipper back to macs, tell your chef he cooks for you and nobody else, you stick 2 fingers up to the council and take them to court for restriction of trade, you paint the place, mop up the p155 but do the customers return?

Here are 4 tracks 2 of them, Sheffield and Peterborough renowned for good racing, Wolves also can be pretty good... and Leicester. Sheffield and Peterborough seem to be more rounded ovals where Leicester seems to be shaped more like Wolves. Wolves is 264m, Leicester 300m, Peterborough 336m & Sheffield 361m. Leicester does have a lot of weird off camber banking though. Pick the bones out of that

I think it's all down to the play offs Big Al, If PO's weren't in operation I suspect there wouldn't have been so many changes, if any at all

Scott Nicholls isn't a journeyman... according to the website he's a hearthrob

This is a symptom of the play-off system that British Speedway currently runs, when there's 4 spots available in a league of 7/8 teams most if not all clubs seasons are still alive until the final 6 weeks or so of the season... when in the good/bad old days before play-offs, if you started the season off poorly, that was your season pretty much done. These days we're told that a club has had a successful season if they've reached the play-offs and have only been 4 matches off of a league title

Will this be like the "goodbye to the Abbey" commemorative meeting?

That's what makes what we've got at BP all the more galling

NL & CL should be riding standard sealed unit engines, I read on another thread somebody saying that a rider, I can't remember who, but somebody of NL/CL standard was riding Ash-Tec engines so should be competitive! I've said before that riders of that standard would gain a lot more speed and be faster by learning to be better riders than having expensive tuned engines No... but it doesn't have to be so black and white does it? Time has come to commit to BL or wave goodbye, take the Aussies for example, live and work in the UK or live and work in Europe I remember when the BSPA teamed up with some marketing agency a load of years back and a load of minor celebrities appeared at a number of tracks... I'll never forget the night I saw Hinge & Bracket at Wolves Time for them to get a job to supplement their Speedway or retire from Speedway and do something else... the sport in this country can't be run for the few who can't make it pay

My local track, Leicester, pretty much perfect I'd say

or just start watering it before the inside goes too slick

I decided to leave my Pizza and Beer in the fridge and did pop along to this one and I thought it was one of the better meetings of the season. A fast track does not necessarily mean an entertaining track and the watering does remain a problem... I doubt what you say about the agreement for watering is true, I go to a lot of tracks where the watering of the track is not an issue so why would everybody object to just the Leicester track being watered?

He's going backwards now, confidence seems to be shot, now quitting when he's at the back and returning to the pits after 3 laps

While the riders continue to bleed the sport dry

How much are you paying?

is it only £17? Bargain!

What a lot of you are forgetting is that most promotions and KL in particular don't give a toss about riding away from home, why would KL promote Leicester's meeting? This has been evident in the last couple of years by the standard of the team KL have sent to Leicester, heck they can't even be bothered to inform the fans at a home meeting (vs Leicester) about what was happening let alone away from home. As for tonight, it's a tough one... do I travel the mile up the road on what's looking like being a nice evening hand over my £18 to watch 13 gate and go heats with the possibility of a sun delay and come home covered in dust? Or do I sit at home with a Pizza and a Beer watching the action from the NSS?

And the stewards themselves are standing... they're risking their lives to keep us safe

This requires a bit of effort

The trouble with attracting new fans or even enticing old ones back is that it's just such a lottery going to the Speedway and that's not just whether it's going to be a good match or not it's the weather, the make up of the teams, the delays, the standard of the track, the number of ambulances in attendance, the tractor racing, the standard of the stadium... the list goes on I hate taking new people along to Speedway because there's always the chance of a disaster happening, fortunately on the few occasions that I have taken new folk along I have got away with it and even then non of them had a burning desire to return. When I was stood at KL the other week as that disaster unfolded I was thinking to myself... what if I had brought a first timer along with me... who would take that chance. Similar happened at Peterborough a few weeks before. Fortunately I am able to travel for my Speedway so I just vow never to return to KL again, but if I didn't and KL was "my track" that'd be me done with Speedway after being treated like that.

I kind of am

Why don't the put their hands in their pockets then and splash some of the polish Jack Holder cash!

I'm not having a pop at the guy, I just wondered why the op thinks he's going to be the saviour... I remember the super7 series, I'll take your word for the KL promotion... Does he have the respect of many people in the sport... Like Colin Pratt and Peter Oakes for example?

... But what has Jonathan Chapman ever done for Speedway?