What will 2026 UK speedway bring?

[PhilTheAce]

lets think outside the box

 

MARCH - MAY/JUNE SUPER LEAGUE & BSN SERIES

One league with the 5 teams that want it, or any team that wants it, no points limit, build whatever team you want, at that time of the year there will be more GP riders wanting the extra meetings, this should bring in a decent sponsor for the super league, and the winning teams gets prize money.

 

running along this will be the BSN series for the teams that dont want to be involved in the super league.

 

JUNE - OCTOBER BRITISH LEAGUE

 

All teams then join the British league on what will be a good championship standard

 

 

Edited 3 hours ago by PhilTheAce

[MB723]

38 minutes ago, TTT said:

Why do Glasgow get various FIM events? Because it's a top level UK Speedway Model.

Why do Glasgow sign as many Championship Heat Leaders as the rules allow them too? Because they've got the money too.

Why are Glasgow signing Ekstraliga riders for second tier British Speedway that's a League mostly designed for the following? See above answer.

A -> British D/UP's that struggle to get opportunities in other well known Speedway Leagues abroad.

B -> Australian riders who are UK based but aren't good enough to get team places in the Premiership.

C -> Top end NDL Riders to gain more experience before taking the next step in their careers.

The only reason why Glasgow don't want to move is because of the Berwick/Edinburgh situation and that sort of outlook is why British Speedway is a mess, Too many Promoters / Owners who stroll into AGM's every winter with a me, myself and I mind set instead of putting British Speedway first.

If that's the point of the league there should be team building rules to allow that but there isn't and we built a team to the rules that didn't even end up winning a trophy so obviously we're not the only ones who can sign the best riders, does our 2024 team look like something a team with infinite money bags would put together?

Why should Glasgow take the risk into a top league that is killing every other team that goes into it, giving up our Friday race night and isolating ourselves from our local clubs? Glasgow owners also sponsor the championship, will they stop that to save money in turn starting the championship on a downward spiral?

Glasgow's closest club in the top league is Belle Vue, between those two clubs you have not just Berwick and Edinburgh but Redcar and Workington with Scunthorpe around equal distance.

Glasgow is trying to get families coming with their kids to enjoy speedway, a Friday night works well since parents don't have to worry about kids getting home too late on a school night.

Finally Glasgow isn't a speedway city, the owners have mentioned it before but no one cares if Tai Woffinden of Emil Sayfutdinov are in town, most people who you'd tell would look at you like you're insane. You wouldn't get a big draw of new fans flooding in for these top league names, maybe a couple fans from Edinburgh/Berwick but not enough to balance the increased wages.

I understand being a premiership team fan wanting a competitive exciting league, despite all the above points I'd love for us to give the top league a go as long as it means the club won't die in a year but what are the actual benefits to moving up from a business perspective? From your posts it just sounds like you want to punish Glasgow for doing a good job .

[Weeyin]

21 hours ago, TTT said:

Just my opinion.

Championship clubs are nothing without Premiership clubs, It's the Premiership clubs that keep the sport alive in the UK even though it leaves some of the club bosses out of pocket.

The day the Premiership collapses that see's all of the GP / Ekstraliga riders exit is the day when British Speedway collapses for good.

Nowhere near enough good riders to go around for one big league, 27 out of the 49 riders that finished the season in an official Premiership 1-7 also rode in the Championship.

Say we have One Big League featuring 15 Teams (Inc. Northampton) and 5 Riders per a Team = 75 Riders

85 Riders in Total (Exc. D/UP's) finished the 2025 Premiership & Championship seasons in an official 1-7.

One big league then see's mass exits from British Speedway altogether due to race nights being scattered throughout the week (21 Riders Minimum)

5 GP Riders (Kurtz, Bewley, Doyle, Fricke & J. Holder)

7 Ekstraliga Riders (Lidsey, Blodorn, Rew, Sayfutdinov, B. Cook, Janowski & Tungate)

9 Ekstraliga 2 Riders (Musielak, Zagar, Brennan, Kvech, Iversen, Douglas, Becker, Pickering & C. Holder)

That then takes the total No. of riders down to 64 to a point where lower ranked riders from the NDL have to fill those spots, The same lower ranked NDL Riders who Championship clubs aren't even interested in using.

Premiership has to continue until the day British Speedway collapses for good and someone has to step up and fill one of the voids left by Oxford/Birmingham.

Whisper is that Northampton may be the one to dive in head first at the deep end by running in the Premiership but everything with them would be a guessing game as to how many punters they get through the turnstiles and stuff.

Glasgow on the other hand have everything in place to run Premiership Speedway, Facilities, Track, Attendances, Sponsorship, Finances so instead of potentially putting Northampton at risk before they've even returned, Club bosses need to block Glasgow from competiting in the Championship and instead give them an ultimatum -> Premiership or Nothing and they'll soon bite the bullet and say Premiership.

Glasgow do not want to change from Friday night racing, yes they have raced on other nights but we have hundreds of kids with their families, on a Friday, crowd levels drop for midweek meetings. Also our volunteers have stated that regular midweek meetings would affect their availability.

 

 

[mikebv]

1 hour ago, Weeyin said:

Glasgow do not want to change from Friday night racing, yes they have raced on other nights but we have hundreds of kids with their families, on a Friday, crowd levels drop for midweek meetings. Also our volunteers have stated that regular midweek meetings would affect their availability.

 

 

Let's take one of the best ran clubs and make them completely change their operating model and business plan, and make them follow an operating model and business plan that has shown it clearly isn't fit for purpose, nor sustainable...

What a great idea....

[TTT]

I fully understand the Glasgow race night situation and stuff but this is the point I'm trying to make.

Promoters aren't willing to budge on anything and they're not willing to put the Sport first in this country.

Every AGM should see every Promoter sit around a table and say....What can we do to make the Sport better in this country? What can we do to get a new generation of fans to take an interest? What can we do to make our Sport more attractive to TV companies etc.

But they don't, They just waltz into an AGM every year with a small minded ideology, Where everything is based around what's best for me and my club only and that is why everything is going to collapse eventually.

[Phannan]

Promotion and relegation. That’s the answer imo. That way nobody gets to choose what league they want to operate in . The premiership and the championship should be embroiled together in that way. Yet it feels like a them and us narrative now. One league’s supporters looking down at the other. It would stop the big fish in a small pond problem too. But I suppose football, cricket, rugby etc have always done it wrong whereas the brilliantly run speedway has the answers.

[mikebv]

2 minutes ago, TTT said:

I fully understand the Glasgow race night situation and stuff but this is the point I'm trying to make.

Promoters aren't willing to budge on anything and they're not willing to put the Sport first in this country.

Every AGM should see every Promoter sit around a table and say....What can we do to make the Sport better in this country? What can we do to get a new generation of fans to take an interest? What can we do to make our Sport more attractive to TV companies etc.

But they don't, They just waltz into an AGM every year with a small minded ideology, Where everything is based around what's best for me and my club only and that is why everything is going to collapse eventually.

They have done exactly the same thing for decades..

They have no other way of running the sport as they don't have the required skill set, nor employ experts in marketing and sports administration, to move the sport into the 21st century...

There is a report on the BBC Sports section about UK Rugby League, where the CEO of the Aussie version (the No1 sport in Aussie and "flying"), talks about the lack of independent direction, lack of TV money investment, and a lack of a  clear ten year plan, with the sport being very insular, very self regulating, and forever tinkering around the edges,  but without any clear vision and direction...

You could actually replace the words "UK Rugby League" with "UK Speedway" and the words "Aussie version" with "Polish Version"..

[1 valve]

6 minutes ago, Phannan said:

Promotion and relegation. That’s the answer imo. That way nobody gets to choose what league they want to operate in . The premiership and the championship should be embroiled together in that way. Yet it feels like a them and us narrative now. One league’s supporters looking down at the other. It would stop the big fish in a small pond problem too. But I suppose football, cricket, rugby etc have always done it wrong whereas the brilliantly run speedway has the answers.

The immediate issue with promotion & relegation is that there is every chance a promoted team would have to change its race night to either a Monday or Thursday. 
And we all know what the self serving promoters feel about that!

[mikebv]

8 minutes ago, Phannan said:

Promotion and relegation. That’s the answer imo. That way nobody gets to choose what league they want to operate in . The premiership and the championship should be embroiled together in that way. Yet it feels like a them and us narrative now. One league’s supporters looking down at the other. It would stop the big fish in a small pond problem too. But I suppose football, cricket, rugby etc have always done it wrong whereas the brilliantly run speedway has the answers.

Too many meetings are ran with zero jeopardy to make them attractive enough to go and watch...

Promotion and Relegation would at least bring that jeopardy...

[noaksey]

It'll never be any different without an independent league body running the sport and that won't happen 

[Sir Sidney]

23 minutes ago, mikebv said:

Too many meetings are ran with zero jeopardy to make them attractive enough to go and watch...

Promotion and Relegation would at least bring that jeopardy...

And quite possibly closure for both clubs!

[IainB]

3 hours ago, mikebv said:

I think we have seen how some clubs who are bank rolled using money from a larger company owned by the promoters, can struggle when that company loses business..

You often never know what the next 12 months will bring in business so any "financial projects" you get involved with away from your "core business" have to either break even or deliver non threatening sustainable (and budgeted), losses, and be part of your overall business profit and loss plan...

With question marks over the government's motability scheme I doubt the Glasgow promotion would be looking at bank rolling a promotion to the Premiership without the club being self sustaining, which I doubt it is even at Championship level. 

[KevtheRev]

1 hour ago, mikebv said:

Too many meetings are ran with zero jeopardy to make them attractive enough to go and watch...

Promotion and Relegation would at least bring that jeopardy...

 Agree with your first point, however, if you had promotion and relegation, you'll get teams wanting to lose so they don't get promoted!

[TTT]

I get why fans of Championship clubs would go with an I don't care outlook towards the Premiership.

But just think about the picture here.......If the Premiership collapses, The Championship as you currently know it, Will collapse with it.

Years of failure and incompetence has led us to this situation that the Sport currently finds itself in over here in the UK.

Drastic change now needs to happen and fast, Instead of the usual song and dance that we get at the AGM where they try and keep as many Promoters as happy as possible to the detriment of the Sport.

Leeway has to happen this time around and every decision has to be made in the best interests of the Sport and not in the best interests for a particular Promotion / Club even if it leaves some Promoters unhappy.

The Sport for the first time in years has to be prioritised over any Club / Promotion.

[mikebv]

41 minutes ago, TTT said:

I get why fans of Championship clubs would go with an I don't care outlook towards the Premiership.

But just think about the picture here.......If the Premiership collapses, The Championship as you currently know it, Will collapse with it.

Years of failure and incompetence has led us to this situation that the Sport currently finds itself in over here in the UK.

Drastic change now needs to happen and fast, Instead of the usual song and dance that we get at the AGM where they try and keep as many Promoters as happy as possible to the detriment of the Sport.

Leeway has to happen this time around and every decision has to be made in the best interests of the Sport and not in the best interests for a particular Promotion / Club even if it leaves some Promoters unhappy.

The Sport for the first time in years has to be prioritised over any Club / Promotion.

They have two solutions..

1. Run a "Super League" with (five or maybe six?) teams at last years tier one level and hope they get some TV coverage.  With those teams then running a 2nd team in a league that matches a cross between last years Championship and NDL levels, with rider/average controls in place to share out the HL's. 

Or 2.

No GP or Polish contracted riders at all and just running one league at a Championship/NDL level running on any nights the clubs want to, to maximise crowds, with some kind of average/rider control to share around the HL's...

Let's face facts. .

Bringing back the GP/Top stars simply hasn't worked across the league, as fans are now able to watch them ride in Sweden on Tuesday, Poland on  Friday and Sunday, and in the GP's, Euro Championships, SON, SWC etc virtually every week of the season...

With several visits to your own track during the year, any "novelty" has now long gone and their presence simply hasn't added the numbers to the atrendances that was obviously hoped for, and intended, to do..

Ipswich fans may say different, however, when they travelled away "huge crowds" didn't pay to watch Emil and Doyle and even at home in the many POQ "dead rubbers" their crowds, whilst better than anyone elses, were hardly "bumper". 

Contrast and compare Emil's first season to his last away from home. It became just another Speedway meeting, where, in his first year there was some "box office" to his arrival at your track..

The Aces had some very low crowds with two of the top 3 riders in the world, (being two of the most exciting riders too), riding for them...

I would say the lack of jeopardy and repetition of visitors, in so many meetings, keep more fans away than the GP riders can attract, especially as they are only "big names" in a tiny, tiny pond, so hardly anyone outside the small number of followers of the sport, in fhe UK, could even name them..

One league will at least bring some different teams to tracks, which may stimulate some "novelty value" at least....

Granted, it's a low bar, but the current operating model clearly doesn't work...

Edited 31 minutes ago by mikebv

[Ben91]

1 hour ago, TTT said:

I get why fans of Championship clubs would go with an I don't care outlook towards the Premiership.

But just think about the picture here.......If the Premiership collapses, The Championship as you currently know it, Will collapse with it.

Years of failure and incompetence has led us to this situation that the Sport currently finds itself in over here in the UK.

Drastic change now needs to happen and fast, Instead of the usual song and dance that we get at the AGM where they try and keep as many Promoters as happy as possible to the detriment of the Sport.

Leeway has to happen this time around and every decision has to be made in the best interests of the Sport and not in the best interests for a particular Promotion / Club even if it leaves some Promoters unhappy.

The Sport for the first time in years has to be prioritised over any Club / Promotion.

Your last paragraph is bang on. Making a Championship club take a bullet isn’t the way to achieve it.

More clubs can sustain the lower level of racing. Evidenced by the Championship containing more tracks. The way to serve the sport as a whole is to bring the standard to the level that is sustainable across the board. The issue then becomes that because of the mismanagement of the last X amount of years we now have a shortfall of Championship standard riders (let alone Premiership). Not to mention stadium rent costs only going in one direction. 

Basically we’re in a huge mess. The solution needs to help as many tracks as possible survive in the short term and thrive in the long term, not just be a vehicle for Ipswich to be able to retain Doyle and Sayfutdinov.