tarabanko

Firstly Mick Poole writes: "I am embarrassed to call myself a former speedway rider. Now dont get me wrong I am all for rider safety and I know exactly how dangerous our sport can be having sustained career ending injuries that would cause these so called professionals to pee in their pants. "The track was indeed patchy after a heavy downpour at 9.30pm the night before.......my 63 year-old father, Terry, started the grader at 10am on race day.....He did not stop working on the track until 7.30pm without a break, after the riders did not want to practice. The riders also provided advice on how they wanted the track prepared, which he complied with, only to be told by the riders to prepare the track in the exact opposite manner to what they had requested previously. "The riders (after hearing the spiel from MA that motorcycling is dangerous, etc and if you are not happy with the track you're welcome to go home without penalty) in my opinion held a gun to the MA officials head, threatening legal action if the meeting went ahead. These riders I believe should be suspended for their actions. "They brought our sport into disrepute pure and simple. Since when has the tail wagged the dog?" "Leigh Adams offered to test the track for them and them he got shot down in flames by these fairies. If these guys are professionals why couldn't they have at least tried the track.......I have a 13-year old son who races junior speedway and dirt-track whom I worry about him every time he puts his helmet on. A rider from Queensland came down to ride his 350cc speedway bike and said he didn't travel all that way not to have a ride - he was told by the fairies to 'shut up mate, you are only on a 350'. What a joke, nice one girls. "I will say Leigh Adams, Adam Shields, Travis McGowan, Todd Wiltshire, Craig Watson, Chris Holder, Mark Jones and Jason Doyle as well as some others were willing to try. I wonder what would happen if these guys get the privilege to ride in a GP on tracks similar to what was on offer and try to hold a gun to Ole Olsen's head? Shame on you SPEEDWAY RIDERS, you should all take up netball. If any of you feel the need to try and explain yourself, you have my number, you know who you are." (end) Rod Colquhoun writes: "...the (Australian Championship) Gosford round was held to ransom by a few riders who managed to root what would have been a pretty good series. The riders in question have not been named elsewhere but I feel it my duty to blow the whistle on the offenders and give my view on their reasoning. "RORY SCHLIEN is fast gaining a reputation as a pain in the ass and this view was enhanced at Gosford. He came close to getting knocked out (literally) last time Gosford held a round when he decided he didn't like the track and threw a tantrum. The kid can ride, but he carries some serious baggage. I would say he was the ringleader at Gosford. He was almost equal in points with Todd Wiltshire in the race to win the new bike (first non-GP rider) and his dislike of the track surface made him doubt he could fend off Todd that night, so he urged cancellation of the meeting. Piss weak. "Note: He did four flying laps at Coventry a couple of months ago in a pair of boxer shorts, so surely he cannot put safety at the top of his list of priorities? "DAVE WATT is a talented bloke, but save for a few good rides at Gillman he failed to fire a shot all series. I think after his Mildura performance (well below expectations) he just wanted to go home and a possible rain-off at Gosford was the easy ticket. Dave has just signed for Oxford in the UK and I think promoter Aaron Lanney will feel more like a kindergarten teacher than a promoter when trying to sift through Dave's needs. "JASON LYONS was a pale shadow of himself during the whole series and I personally hoped he would (have) saved some pride by pulling out of the competition after Mildura, a place at which he normally shines. Further discussion revealed a broken wrist as well as a few other problems which prevented him from committing fully to the task at hand. Sadly, one of Australia's most robust characters took the easy way out at Gosford. "Personally disappointing for me, as I am a huge fan of Lyons. "KEVIN DOOLAN is not a bad rider, but his opinion on this night should have been kept to himself. There were far more qualified people to cast an opinion on the track than Doolan, but mud sticks and he did his share of talking, when silence would have been much smarter. "'There were also varying degrees of dissent from Troy Batchelor and Simon Stead(UK) and I am not looking to save face for them, but they were not as vocal as the four. "When you consider that the last placed rider in each round of the title gets $400 it makes their desire to cancel all the more baffling." (end) The above comments appeared in Speedway Racing News (Jan 25-Feb 8 issue), declaring "Speedway's night of shame" and "The truth behind the Gosford fiasco." The publisher of that magazine, David Tapp, writes: "I can't ever recall being ashamed to call myself a speedway fan but this unthinkable scenario occurred at Gosford Speedway on Thursday night January 12, 2006. For the first time in a life time of following speedway I was appalled and disgusted by a sequence of events that did more damage to speedway's credibility in more than three decades of watching the sport. "...the track commentator announced over the public address system that the event wouldn't be going ahead, because a handful of riders had declared the track too dangerous to ride. "You need to be aware that a fair bit of rain had fallen the night before, but no rain whatsoever fell on the actual day of the event. "A handful of riders, each full-time professionals.......said a winrow (pile) of dirt that had been left by the track curator (the promoter) up against the fence was too dangerous. As was another winrow graded about one metre in from the infield. Apparently they created an inherent risk. Furthermore, at the exit to turn two was a wet, patchy part of the track that may have posed a risk to riders. "Race Director Ivan Golding and Referee David Mills together asked the Gosford Promoter (Terry Poole) to remove the winrow he had left against the fence because of safety concerns. Poole attempted this, but his efforts to stockpile so much wet earth proved in vein. "According to Golding he, in conjunction with Mills, decided at 6pm the meeting would not go ahead, yet an announcement to the public was not made until 7.30. You could just imagine how cheesed the paying public were. I even spotted the great Steve Waugh sitting in the crowd, waiting patiently with his family as this embarrassing comedy of errors unfolded. "I have never seen such a rudderless ship in my entire life. No one was in charge and seemingly no one had a plan. People had driven from all over Australia for this event, or flown in from New Zealand; only to be treated like fools. "To those riders who refused to ride; hang your head in shame. Is it any wonder that the sport of solo racing in Australia is all but dead? You are all professional speedway riders and you would have ridden on tracks far worse in England than at Gosford on January 12, so what was the drama this time? I suspect none of you give a rats about the sport in this country and quite happily stood back and watched as the credibility of the Australian Solo Championship evaporated. "Memo to whoever was running the show. The riders that didn't want to ride should have been told to go and sit in the pits and take no part, allowing the other riders to get out onto the track and put on the best show possible for the assembled spectators. The prizemoney...should have been distributed among those riders that wanted to do the right thing. "Bearing in mind most riders wanted to race and the likes of Leigh Adams and Todd Wiltshire offered to do a few laps to check the track surface. This was deemed inappropriate as commonsense was scarce, during what can be best described as comedy capers. "I spoke to Adams and Wiltshire afterwards and both said the track was fine to race on. Adams said any rider that wasn't up to riding the Gosford surface and no right being in the Australian Championship in the first place. Adams also confirmed that riders present race on far worse tracks in Europe every second week." * note: David Tapp continued to write more. Got this from Aussie Steve Magro

Intresting figures. Thanx!

Got mine today, looks super!

Tony Rickardsson recived the finest price a sportsman can get. He vas voted to 2005 years sportsman ahead likes of: Kajsa Bergqvist, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Carolina Klüft, Annika Sörenstam of the year and he recived 'Jerringpriset' which is the Swedish Peoples price. Tony did get 63% of the votes from the people in Sweden a total of: 437 426 votes. Tony has done so much for speedway in Sweden and is the 7th most liked sportsman in Sweden. Links here to Swedish Papers: http://www.aftonbladet.se/vss/sport/story/...,763457,00.html http://expressen.se/expressen/jsp/polopoly.jsp?a=507099 and here: http://www.masarnaavesta.nu/index.cgi

Gp in Eskilstuna May 20 Website: At this page http://www.swedishgp.com/ you can get the info you need to know how to book tickets, book hotel and so on. Cheers Mikael

Look here: http://www1.ticnet.se/EventList?eventSubGr...eLocaleTo=en_GB

Iceracing, Motala Sweden March 3 at Motala Icestadium Line Up: Posa Serenius Stefan Svensson Jan Klatovsky Antony Klatovsky Juri Polikarpov Viatcheslav Nikulin Seppo Siira Tommy Flyktman Peter Koij Tomas Ekström Per-Anders Lindström Mikael Persson Heinz Goldi --------------------------- Reserv: Mark Uzzell 3 places left to fill

Some in the Localpapers. In the big papers: Expressen, Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter not a thing!

3 Per Olov Serenius (3 3 3 3 3) 15 Still kick butts! He is awesome the fireman Posa!

Lots of meetings for the promising youngster Nikolaj Klindt in Swedish, Danish and Polish Leagues. I hope he suceed as it is a BIG task to ride in three different countries.

Yes!

Its not a tidy stadium at Smallmead. But I think it can be a good racingtrack. The venue will be refurbish I belive then if a World Cup meeting will be held there.

Its not the same whithout the iceking Kenny Olsson from Sweden!

Iceracing, Örnsköldsvik Sweden 20060108 Jämtarna 51 Ulf Engenström 13 Martin Ljungkvist 12 Marian Kreklau 10 Hans-Olov Olsén 9 P-A Lindström 7 Funbo MS 48 Torleif Burman 13 Antti Akko 12 Fredrik Olsson 10 Jocke Söderström 8 Paul Johansson 5 Örnsköldsvik 43 Posa Serenius 15 Stefan Svensson 13 Hans Tjärnberg 7 Gösta Sundelin 5 Ulf Ledström 3 SMK Gävle 4 Peter Jansson 2 Peter Lundqvist 1 Totte Nilsson 1 Benny Hörstedt 0 Micke Persson 0 Next match at Bollnäs 11 february 2006

There you go!

Thank you very much for the 'details', much appreciated! / Mikael

Sad that Sweden or Finland hasnt more iceracers. Russia got some of them for sure.

I want the wildcard goes to Nikolaj Klindt Thats a bright talent. I have seen him two times and he looks better than Morten Risager, me thinks!

I have no idea, but can look into the matter if you wish. / Mikael

Masarna has changed their webadress to: http://www.masarnaavesta.nu/

Thanks very much for the updates!

Thanks! / Mikael

Rune Holta has been threathened to life of Czestochawa fans as he has left the Lions after 7 years for Stal Rzeszow. If you can norwegian you can read the whole article here: http://web3.aftenbladet.no/sport/article246825.ece