What will 2026 UK speedway bring?

[enotian]

The split of opinions here is exactly the problem that needs to be solved.

One big league (any race night therefore no star names or enough riders but otherwise sustainable). Or A Premiership (Mon & Thursday with star names but not enough teams).

As per my previous post I think you can have both. But the Premiership needs to be slimmed down.  8 teams 7 home and 7 away. Get it all done over June and July when the sports channels have no football. Like The Hundred in cricket.  Give the broadcaster something they can focus on and market to a wider audience for a shorter period. That probably provides enough fixtures for the star riders and promoters, especially if whatever TV money is for a small number fixtures. Less is more.

But not for the domestic riders or maybe the stadium owners or supporters

The solution, Premiership teams also operate a 2nd tier team. Alongside the other current 2nd tier teams ie 14 team league. Where the riders come from at this point I don't know so maybe 6 or even 5 man teams initially. You could even have a different promoter running the 2nd Tier team.

Yes the 2nd tier teams might not attract the same attendances as the Premiership fixtures but the operating cost will be lower without the star riders.

It's basically the franchise cricket model where the top stars move around the globe to play in different leagues for different franchises supplemented by local players who return to domestic leagues once the circus has moved to the next (town) country.

[TB1]

On 9/28/2025 at 8:11 PM, RoundTheBoards said:

Absolutely spot on.

I found the Speedway Star recent edition which claimed something like "70% of fans want one big league" to be totally irresponsible.  It seemed to be 70% of people responding to a dishonest question 

The question they were responding to was "Would you support one big league if it had 14 strong teams with good quality riders, and equally competitive teams?"

But get that thought out of your head.  A "yes" answer to that question is irrelevant.  That's not an option.

One big league, running on any racenight, would automatically rule out anyone who races in the Polish leagues.

Gone would be:    Max Fricke, Jack Holder, Brady Kurtz, Dan Bewley, Emil Sayfutdinov, Jaimon Lidsey, Josh Pickering, Ryan Douglas, Jason Doyle, Michael Jepsen-Jensen, Chris Holder, Tom Brennan, Luke Becker, Jan Kvech, Tobias Musielak, Nicolai Klindt, Matej Zagar, Keynan Rew, Ben Cook, Maciej Janowski, Rohan Tungate, Norick Blodorn, Francis Gusts.

So that's 23 riders gone from Britain.

So what will the Premiership bring to a new combined league?     JUST ADAM ELLIS !

Every other rider who ride in the Premiership in 2025 (apart from Adam Ellis) doubled up into the Championship.   We can't count them twice.

So, the 5 teams joining the "One Big League" (Belle Vue, King's Lynn, Ipswich, Leicester, Sheffield) are bringing Adam Ellis to the party, but they need 5 x 7 = 35 riders.

So these big 5 need to take 34 of the doubling up riders....  

The remaining 9 championship clubs need 9 x 7 = 63 riders.....   but 34 of them are not availsble because they can no longer double up.

So suddenly we need a further 34 riders.   Where are they coming from? 

We could look to the National League, but many of the NDL riders already double-up into the Championship, others are still only 15 years old, so even if we take every NDL rider right down to the lowest 3.00 newcomer, we still can't get close to filling 14 "One Big League" teams.

Then of course, with no one able to double up, will riders be happy to have their income reduced by so much?  Or will they quit the sport?

What happens when someone gets injured?  Where will replacement riders come from?

ONE BIG LEAGUE CANNOT POSSIBLY WORK.

 

 

 

 

 

 

SPOT ON, however it is getting to the point where the turkeys won't have a choice on whether or not they vote for Christmas!

[YeOldPitGate]

2 hours ago, TB1 said:

SPOT ON, however it is getting to the point where the turkeys won't have a choice on whether or not they vote for Christmas!

I do wonder if the best of pretty much a load of bad choices would be to somehow get both leagues up to 8 teams each then race once home and away then into play offs.

Okay it's not many fixtures but look at the struggle every year to try and get matches over the line even in the current reduced format where your running into October cold nights/rain etc.

Second given most teams rent/lease the stadium they run in, losses should in theory be roughly halved due to reduced number of meetings plus you won't end up seeing the same visiting away teams at home 3-5 times a season.

As others have said the biggest conundrum is one big league won't work, so the most important thing is running on your best target market night and within your means, the progress made by Plymouth this year is a rare ray of light, the issue for them is hoping they have some teams to race against in 2026.

The Fords and Glasgow management might be tempted up for a shortened 7 home and away fixture list on the basis of losses might be contained or they might even make a tiny profit if they get to play offs.

Very few/if any good choices sadly but that's the best outcome I can think of the Poles run once home and away and are making a far better fist of it than the UK.

[1 valve]

17 minutes ago, YeOldPitGate said:

I do wonder if the best of pretty much a load of bad choices would be to somehow get both leagues up to 8 teams each then race once home and away then into play offs.

Okay it's not many fixtures but look at the struggle every year to try and get matches over the line even in the current reduced format where your running into October cold nights/rain etc.

Second given most teams rent/lease the stadium they run in, losses should in theory be roughly halved due to reduced number of meetings plus you won't end up seeing the same visiting away teams at home 3-5 times a season.

As others have said the biggest conundrum is one big league won't work, so the most important thing is running on your best target market night and within your means, the progress made by Plymouth this year is a rare ray of light, the issue for them is hoping they have some teams to race against in 2026.

The Fords and Glasgow management might be tempted up for a shortened 7 home and away fixture list on the basis of losses might be contained or they might even make a tiny profit if they get to play offs.

Very few/if any good choices sadly but that's the best outcome I can think of the Poles run once home and away and are making a far better fist of it than the UK.

Slowly but surely folk on this forum are beginning to understand (although not necessarily accept) that there are insufficient riders available to make one big league and that the amount of current riders doubling up to enable teams to exist is actually bad for the credibility of the sport. 
Your post makes some good points and the suggestion to run less meetings could fit into a final solution. 
However, as I and others elsewhere have said, one barrier to progress is the promoters themselves, who first and foremost take the view of “how does this effect me” rather than “will this help the sport” Take Poole for example a very well run and profitable club why, because they choose to be the big fish in a small pond with less outgoings on riders.  Unfortunately there is not the volume of riders with the same skill levels who make up the Poole team to replicate across the board especially considering the restrictions on race nights & doubling up etc.  

I guess we have no choice but to wait and see what exciting news & changes the close season & Speedway Ventures brings forth. 

[Falcon1983]

There is a solution where you could run one league incorporating all teams but a race format where heats are split, offering a junior section where they race off against each other for a team point, and a main feature card where heat leaders and 2nd strings race their format for 2 league points.

Simply call it the British League with a regional cup thrown into the mix.

 

 

[1 valve]

1 hour ago, Falcon1983 said:

There is a solution where you could run one league incorporating all teams but a race format where heats are split, offering a junior section where they race off against each other for a team point, and a main feature card where heat leaders and 2nd strings race their format for 2 league points.

Simply call it the British League with a regional cup thrown into the mix.

 

 

Heat leaders & second strings make up Five riders per team and to put it simply there are not enough of those riders available in the uk to support that format across one league. The maximum teams that could support your suggestion would be eight (just) and there would be the need to adhere to fixed race nights of Monday & Thursday. 

[Ben91]

3 hours ago, 1 valve said:

Slowly but surely folk on this forum are beginning to understand (although not necessarily accept) that there are insufficient riders available to make one big league and that the amount of current riders doubling up to enable teams to exist is actually bad for the credibility of the sport. 
Your post makes some good points and the suggestion to run less meetings could fit into a final solution. 
However, as I and others elsewhere have said, one barrier to progress is the promoters themselves, who first and foremost take the view of “how does this effect me” rather than “will this help the sport” Take Poole for example a very well run and profitable club why, because they choose to be the big fish in a small pond with less outgoings on riders.  Unfortunately there is not the volume of riders with the same skill levels who make up the Poole team to replicate across the board especially considering the restrictions on race nights & doubling up etc.  

I guess we have no choice but to wait and see what exciting news & changes the close season & Speedway Ventures brings forth. 

There aren’t insufficient riders. There are insufficient riders of sufficient quality. Granted it all amounts to the same thing, bad news for British Speedway and its fans. That lack of “good enough” riders is at least partly a result of the doubling up doors being jammed wide open for all about 15 years ago. A short sighted decision at the time that is now coming home to roost. At that point there were more than enough riders to go round. Rider power probably drove that one. Recently it’s been exasperated by the tighter visa rules post-Brexit it seems. 

It’s definitely a case of a best case scenario out of the current mess. One league seems to me to be more of a ballsy attempt to give the sport a long term future, not without massive potential pitfalls. The standard would drop, it’s unavoidable, but it could be the only way to repopulate the domestic rider pool in the mid to long term. Otherwise we end up losing clubs annually, dropping to teams of five (horrible idea) and before long there’s nothing left. Carrying on as we are seems to be agreeing to continue with death by a thousand cuts. It would be just another sticking plaster. 

 

[1 valve]

43 minutes ago, Ben91 said:

There aren’t insufficient riders. There are insufficient riders of sufficient quality. Granted it all amounts to the same thing, bad news for British Speedway and its fans. That lack of “good enough” riders is at least partly a result of the doubling up doors being jammed wide open for all about 15 years ago. A short sighted decision at the time that is now coming home to roost. At that point there were more than enough riders to go round. Rider power probably drove that one. Recently it’s been exasperated by the tighter visa rules post-Brexit it seems. 

It’s definitely a case of a best case scenario out of the current mess. One league seems to me to be more of a ballsy attempt to give the sport a long term future, not without massive potential pitfalls. The standard would drop, it’s unavoidable, but it could be the only way to repopulate the domestic rider pool in the mid to long term. Otherwise we end up losing clubs annually, dropping to teams of five (horrible idea) and before long there’s nothing left. Carrying on as we are seems to be agreeing to continue with death by a thousand cuts. It would be just another sticking plaster. 

 

Well as you say. Insufficient quality is the same as no quality & there’s absolutely no way a (at best) an NDL level of rider should be anywhere near a meeting with GP riders taking part. 
But you also seem to be failing to recognise two other issues with trying to create one league - even with dubious dumbing down included. 
One.meetings could only be run on Monday & Thursday unless dumbing down will include saying goodbye to best part of 45 existing riders who ride in Poland & Scandinavia.
Two. Once some of the up and comers get to a desired standard, they too will depart UK shores  

You are right about one thing - sticking plasters are not the answer  

 

[Falcon1983]

2 hours ago, 1 valve said:

Heat leaders & second strings make up Five riders per team and to put it simply there are not enough of those riders available in the uk to support that format across one league. The maximum teams that could support your suggestion would be eight (just) and there would be the need to adhere to fixed race nights of Monday & Thursday. 

There are enough to make this kind of format work, and as you've responded elsewhere it doesn't mean you lose 48 riders who ride on the continent.

It may mean you might see more guests or sides opting to run on a night which best suits the riders they've signed up 

Nobody is going to run on a Sunday with anyone who rides in Poland but some clubs opting for Tuesday, Wednesday and Fridays may have some wiggle room if fixtures allow with what the danish and swedish leagues are up to

There are insufficient riders is an easy out, its not, it will allow for more opportunity for homegrown and perhaps riders from the commonwealth 

[TB1]

59 minutes ago, Falcon1983 said:

There are enough to make this kind of format work, and as you've responded elsewhere it doesn't mean you lose 48 riders who ride on the continent.

It may mean you might see more guests or sides opting to run on a night which best suits the riders they've signed up 

Nobody is going to run on a Sunday with anyone who rides in Poland but some clubs opting for Tuesday, Wednesday and Fridays may have some wiggle room if fixtures allow with what the danish and swedish leagues are up to

There are insufficient riders is an easy out, its not, it will allow for more opportunity for homegrown and perhaps riders from the commonwealth 

Yes but the homegrown will only earn enough dough to ride a moped! And punters won't pay 25 notes for the privilege. 

[Ben91]

8 hours ago, 1 valve said:

Well as you say. Insufficient quality is the same as no quality & there’s absolutely no way a (at best) an NDL level of rider should be anywhere near a meeting with GP riders taking part. 
But you also seem to be failing to recognise two other issues with trying to create one league - even with dubious dumbing down included. 
One.meetings could only be run on Monday & Thursday unless dumbing down will include saying goodbye to best part of 45 existing riders who ride in Poland & Scandinavia.
Two. Once some of the up and comers get to a desired standard, they too will depart UK shores  

You are right about one thing - sticking plasters are not the answer  

 

Not failing to recognise, I appreciate but don’t completely agree with your opinion and won’t be bombarded into changing my own to suit. We would lose riders, but 45 is extreme. Some would stay.

The one league would of course only work with multiple race nights. That’s where there would need to be a work around, it absolutely means a lower standard sadly. 

The up and comers may decide to go elsewhere when they reach a good standard. Or the promoters could do their job and in that time make Britain a more than viable option for them to stay and even for other riders to come race here. 

Nobody truly wants the standard to drop, doing so for the long term future of having a sport to watch is the only reason I’d accept as a fan if communicated clearly. We’ve reached the point it has to happen. Clubs are falling like dominoes. 

Two leagues with no doubling up calls for one or two existing Championship teams to step up and move to a race night they don’t want, rocking their boats massively and unnecessarily for the benefit of others. It also then makes the second tier incredibly weak with the left over riders. That’s bad for those businesses. How is that fair when the second tier isn’t the one killing clubs hand over fist. Cut your cloth accordingly and be punished with promotion. 

To continue with doubling up (beyond between the “professional” and “development” leagues) just shows massive contempt for fans. It would be the ultimate middle finger, the band playing along happily as the Titanic sinks. 

The sport is (or at least should be) a whole, the whole sport needs to share the burden of the mess it’s got itself into, not give an apathetic “what can we do there’s not enough riders?” 

 

[1 valve]

1 hour ago, Ben91 said:

Not failing to recognise, I appreciate but don’t completely agree with your opinion and won’t be bombarded into changing my own to suit. We would lose riders, but 45 is extreme. Some would stay.

The one league would of course only work with multiple race nights. That’s where there would need to be a work around, it absolutely means a lower standard sadly. 

The up and comers may decide to go elsewhere when they reach a good standard. Or the promoters could do their job and in that time make Britain a more than viable option for them to stay and even for other riders to come race here. 

Nobody truly wants the standard to drop, doing so for the long term future of having a sport to watch is the only reason I’d accept as a fan if communicated clearly. We’ve reached the point it has to happen. Clubs are falling like dominoes. 

Two leagues with no doubling up calls for one or two existing Championship teams to step up and move to a race night they don’t want, rocking their boats massively and unnecessarily for the benefit of others. It also then makes the second tier incredibly weak with the left over riders. That’s bad for those businesses. How is that fair when the second tier isn’t the one killing clubs hand over fist. Cut your cloth accordingly and be punished with promotion. 

To continue with doubling up (beyond between the “professional” and “development” leagues) just shows massive contempt for fans. It would be the ultimate middle finger, the band playing along happily as the Titanic sinks. 

The sport is (or at least should be) a whole, the whole sport needs to share the burden of the mess it’s got itself into, not give an apathetic “what can we do there’s not enough riders?” 

 

I’m not trying to bombard you to change anything. Just trying to help you and others to appreciate the lack of riders available to enable one big league to have any kind of possibility of coming to fruition. To help further here below is a detailed explanation provided by RoundTheBoard earlier in this topic. 

“One big league, running on any racenight, would automatically rule out anyone who races in the Polish leagues.

Gone would be:    Max Fricke, Jack Holder, Brady Kurtz, Dan Bewley, Emil Sayfutdinov, Jaimon Lidsey, Josh Pickering, Ryan Douglas, Jason Doyle, Michael Jepsen-Jensen, Chris Holder, Tom Brennan, Luke Becker, Jan Kvech, Tobias Musielak, Nicolai Klindt, Matej Zagar, Keynan Rew, Ben Cook, Maciej Janowski, Rohan Tungate, Norick Blodorn, Francis Gusts.

So that's 23 riders gone from Britain.

So what will the Premiership bring to a new combined league?     JUST ADAM ELLIS !

Every other rider who ride in the Premiership in 2025 (apart from Adam Ellis) doubled up into the Championship.   We can't count them twice.

So, the 5 teams joining the "One Big League" (Belle Vue, King's Lynn, Ipswich, Leicester, Sheffield) are bringing Adam Ellis to the party, but they need 5 x 7 = 35 riders.

So these big 5 need to take 34 of the doubling up riders....  

The remaining 9 championship clubs need 9 x 7 = 63 riders.....   but 34 of them are not availsble because they can no longer double up.

So suddenly we need a further 34 riders.   Where are they coming from? 

We could look to the National League, but many of the NDL riders already double-up into the Championship, others are still only 15 years old, so even if we take every NDL rider right down to the lowest 3.00 newcomer, we still can't get close to filling 14 "One Big League" teams.”

So whilst I understand that some may say my figure of 45 riders missing is too high as you can see (hopefully) see by adding those riders who double up and those riding on the continent who would need to give the UK a miss 45 is in truth slightly conservative.  
 

looking ahead - I would not be surprised if for 2026 we see a reduction of riders being allowed to double up via reduced team building averages in the championship.  Eight  teams in the top flight league and no NDL. 
Please note, that’s a prediction and not saying what I would do. That’s something entirely different. 

[therefused]

if it is one big league i would highly doubt it would be with seven mean teams. as i replied to that original post that is a MASSIVE assumption that all of those riders would drop GB. 

[PotteringAround]

38 minutes ago, therefused said:

if it is one big league i would highly doubt it would be with seven mean teams. as i replied to that original post that is a MASSIVE assumption that all of those riders would drop GB. 

As people have pointed out, one big league of 14 teams with 7 man teams would be impossible.

Take out the 25ish riders who ride in Poland (and are only available to Britain on Monday and Thursday) and reduce all the doubling-up riders to a single team (another 30+ riders) and you've barely got enough riders left to staff 14 teams of 3 or 4 riders.

You'd need to take every rider from the National League, including every novice 3.00 NDL wobbler, and you still couldn't get to 14 full teams.

The standard or 14 teams would be somewhere between Championship and NDL.   

The level would be a big comedown for Workington or Plymouth fans.   Imagine asking fans of Belle Vue, Ipswich or Sheffield to watch that! 

[FishersGate]

I don't give a toss about GP riders here, I really just want clubs to stay open and the future of the sport to be protected. As much as I love watching Fricke at Leicester, I'm not going to be selfish and demand riders like him stay just because he's top quality. IMO there are enough decent riders out there to create a bigger league but it would be a watered down championship. I'm ok with this personally, I love speedway in the NDL as much as the premiership. I think Poole are the best argument for my case, serial winners and the I don't hear any fans moaning about the standard or quality of riders, yes it helps they build great sides every year but I highly doubt Scunny or Plymouth fans are going to be running to the terraces if they join the premiership next season. It didn't work for Oxford or Birmingham did it? and the crowds at Leicester have actually dropped since moving leagues. Trust me I would love it if a few clubs could come back and join the premiership, but it isn't happening is it? And who will it benefit exactly? I cant think of one championship club that would benefit from moving leagues. All the people suggesting one big league wont work haven't come up with any other solution have they?

What is it then?

A 5 team Premiership?

Northampton to join the prem for financial suicide?

Poole moving up? ( That wont work because race nights)

Glasgow moving up? ( They wont sacrifice the Scottish derby) .

[YeOldPitGate]

5 hours ago, Ben91 said:

Not failing to recognise, I appreciate but don’t completely agree with your opinion and won’t be bombarded into changing my own to suit. We would lose riders, but 45 is extreme. Some would stay.

The one league would of course only work with multiple race nights. That’s where there would need to be a work around, it absolutely means a lower standard sadly. 

The up and comers may decide to go elsewhere when they reach a good standard. Or the promoters could do their job and in that time make Britain a more than viable option for them to stay and even for other riders to come race here. 

Nobody truly wants the standard to drop, doing so for the long term future of having a sport to watch is the only reason I’d accept as a fan if communicated clearly. We’ve reached the point it has to happen. Clubs are falling like dominoes. 

Two leagues with no doubling up calls for one or two existing Championship teams to step up and move to a race night they don’t want, rocking their boats massively and unnecessarily for the benefit of others. It also then makes the second tier incredibly weak with the left over riders. That’s bad for those businesses. How is that fair when the second tier isn’t the one killing clubs hand over fist. Cut your cloth accordingly and be punished with promotion. 

To continue with doubling up (beyond between the “professional” and “development” leagues) just shows massive contempt for fans. It would be the ultimate middle finger, the band playing along happily as the Titanic sinks. 

The sport is (or at least should be) a whole, the whole sport needs to share the burden of the mess it’s got itself into, not give an apathetic “what can we do there’s not enough riders?” 

 

I do think doubling up will remain a necessary evil if they went two leagues of 8 home and away once to keep the likes of Masters, Harris and Lawson on side you would have to allow them to compete in both leagues , I'm really thinking maintain the current status quo but with eight teams shortened season over say four months May, June, July , August when weather should be favourable. Reduced losses also the first struggle thought would be to get the bottom four teams up to a half decent standard so they weren't getting whipped every week like Oxford and Brum which would somehow mean getting 3-5 additional top line riders back to the UK.

[The Cheese]

On 9/28/2025 at 8:11 PM, RoundTheBoards said:

Absolutely spot on.

I found the Speedway Star recent edition which claimed something like "70% of fans want one big league" to be totally irresponsible.  It seemed to be 70% of people responding to a dishonest question 

The question they were responding to was "Would you support one big league if it had 14 strong teams with good quality riders, and equally competitive teams?"

But get that thought out of your head.  A "yes" answer to that question is irrelevant.  That's not an option.

One big league, running on any racenight, would automatically rule out anyone who races in the Polish leagues.

Gone would be:    Max Fricke, Jack Holder, Brady Kurtz, Dan Bewley, Emil Sayfutdinov, Jaimon Lidsey, Josh Pickering, Ryan Douglas, Jason Doyle, Michael Jepsen-Jensen, Chris Holder, Tom Brennan, Luke Becker, Jan Kvech, Tobias Musielak, Nicolai Klindt, Matej Zagar, Keynan Rew, Ben Cook, Maciej Janowski, Rohan Tungate, Norick Blodorn, Francis Gusts.

So that's 23 riders gone from Britain.

So what will the Premiership bring to a new combined league?     JUST ADAM ELLIS !

Every other rider who ride in the Premiership in 2025 (apart from Adam Ellis) doubled up into the Championship.   We can't count them twice.

So, the 5 teams joining the "One Big League" (Belle Vue, King's Lynn, Ipswich, Leicester, Sheffield) are bringing Adam Ellis to the party, but they need 5 x 7 = 35 riders.

So these big 5 need to take 34 of the doubling up riders....  

The remaining 9 championship clubs need 9 x 7 = 63 riders.....   but 34 of them are not availsble because they can no longer double up.

So suddenly we need a further 34 riders.   Where are they coming from? 

We could look to the National League, but many of the NDL riders already double-up into the Championship, others are still only 15 years old, so even if we take every NDL rider right down to the lowest 3.00 newcomer, we still can't get close to filling 14 "One Big League" teams.

Then of course, with no one able to double up, will riders be happy to have their income reduced by so much?  Or will they quit the sport?

What happens when someone gets injured?  Where will replacement riders come from?

ONE BIG LEAGUE CANNOT POSSIBLY WORK.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And with that 'gone list' those that are left include:

Kildemand (36), Craig Cook (38), Sedgmen (34), Palm Toft (35), Harris (43), Masters (34), Lawson (40), Kerr (35), Barker (37), Nicholls (47), Wright (38), King (39), Worrall (34), Simon Lambert (37), Batchelor (38), Iversen (43)

That's almost all of what would effectively be the top group of riders. If people think they can just about manage to find enough riders to sustain one league now, what about in 3 or 5 years?