TTT Posted yesterday at 02:31 PM Report Share Posted yesterday at 02:31 PM 1 hour ago, CoffeeandTV said: What a ridiculous comment. Just because Poland aren't particularly great at the majority of sports we focus on in the UK, you think they are useless at every other sport going? Go and educate yourself on what sports Poland regularly play, such as volleyball, basketball, handball, etc. and you'll soon see they are far better than us and compete at the highest levels. Not to mention individual sports such as, athletics, winter sports, etc. as well. For instance, an all-time combined Summer and Winter Olympics table sees Poland inside of the 20 countries in the world. More like the Entire World focuses on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TTT Posted yesterday at 02:40 PM Report Share Posted yesterday at 02:40 PM 52 minutes ago, WookieboyDon said: I’d fact check before making comments like that. Blatantly not true. They are great at plenty of sports as already mentioned in another post, not to mention that they have one of the greatest female tennis players in Iga Swiatek who is a four time French Open champion, has won the US Open and the biggest of them all, Wimbledon. Also got done for doping. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WookieboyDon Posted yesterday at 02:49 PM Author Report Share Posted yesterday at 02:49 PM 8 minutes ago, TTT said: Also got done for doping. Makes no difference to the point both you and I made… Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoffeeandTV Posted yesterday at 03:09 PM Report Share Posted yesterday at 03:09 PM 36 minutes ago, TTT said: More like the Entire World focuses on. You think the entire world focuses on cricket and rugby, lol. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
castrolargh Posted yesterday at 05:49 PM Report Share Posted yesterday at 05:49 PM On the bright side, at least there won't be riders missing on Thursdays after being recalled to Poland, on " our " day , that we gave up so the poles would relax their rules on the amount of riders trade they controlled Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
old bob at herne bay Posted yesterday at 06:12 PM Report Share Posted yesterday at 06:12 PM The Dean Machine makes a good point.Its on the riders. If they choose to take the chance of riding on Poland for 000s of zloty a point ... they take the risk of not getting paid and/or being instantly dropped if they don't score well. Not sure that Denmark or Sweden offer great paydays compared to the UK either ? For far too long the British promoters have been far too keen to sign up overseas riders in preference to supporting young home grown riders. This is now coming back to bite them on the bum . Already there is talk of signing the latest bunch of youngsters who appeared to show a turn of speed in the SoN.   How about the CL limiting the number of overseas riders in each team in 2026 ? ? and using some of the NDL riders instead. Bet you there would be one or two promoters who would object and not agree ?   2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikebv Posted yesterday at 07:56 PM Report Share Posted yesterday at 07:56 PM 4 hours ago, CoffeeandTV said: You think the entire world focuses on cricket and rugby, lol. And Darts and Snooker..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikebv Posted 10 hours ago Report Share Posted 10 hours ago An interview with Rafal Dobrucki in this weeks excellent Speedway Star tells you all you need to know about the psyche of those who run Speedway in Poland... "Poland provides the livelihood of the sport" being just one of his comments... "Poland speedway effectively sponsors the entire World Championship" being another... Got to say, the Speedway Star, whilst always being a good read, has really dialled up the levels in the past 12 months or so with it's features.... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ouch Posted 7 hours ago Report Share Posted 7 hours ago 2 hours ago, mikebv said: An interview with Rafal Dobrucki in this weeks excellent Speedway Star tells you all you need to know about the psyche of those who run Speedway in Poland... "Poland provides the livelihood of the sport" being just one of his comments... "Poland speedway effectively sponsors the entire World Championship" being another... Got to say, the Speedway Star, whilst always being a good read, has really dialled up the levels in the past 12 months or so with it's features.... When seven out of this years top ten were taken from novice to star in the British League I find it hard to accept their view. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikebv Posted 7 hours ago Report Share Posted 7 hours ago 16 minutes ago, ouch said: When seven out of this years top ten were taken from novice to star in the British League I find it hard to accept their view. When they pay out six figure signing on fees, and then two grand a point, I can see their view.... Â 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IainB Posted 7 hours ago Report Share Posted 7 hours ago (edited) 3 hours ago, mikebv said: An interview with Rafal Dobrucki in this weeks excellent Speedway Star tells you all you need to know about the psyche of those who run Speedway in Poland... "Poland provides the livelihood of the sport" being just one of his comments... "Poland speedway effectively sponsors the entire World Championship" being another... Got to say, the Speedway Star, whilst always being a good read, has really dialled up the levels in the past 12 months or so with it's features.... Sounds like the type of things British promoters would have said back in the 70's and early 80's and look at us now. Back then we were the Speedway powerhouse with everybody else struggling to get a look in. We didn't like it when all these World Championship qualifiers were being held in the back of beyond and the arse end of nowheresville. Poland are in effect killing the rest of the sport worldwide with riders being attracted to the ludicrous amounts of money on offer like moths to the flame (or flies to the 💩). It's down to the FIM to keep them in check but they seem to have little interest in Speedway other than the SGP series. Edited 7 hours ago by IainB 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikebv Posted 7 hours ago Report Share Posted 7 hours ago 7 minutes ago, IainB said: Sounds like the type of things British promoters would have said back in the 70's and early 80's and look at us now. Back then we were the Speedway powerhouse with everybody else struggling to get a look in. We didn't like it when all these World Championship qualifiers were being held in the back of beyond and the arse end of nowheresville. Poland are in effect killing the rest of the sport worldwide with riders being attracted to the ludicrous amounts of money on offer like moths to the flame (or flies to the 💩). It's down to the FIM to keep them in check but they seem to have little interest in Speedway meetings the SGP series. Its clear from the interview that the FIM are not held in any regard whatsoever by the Poles.. They do believe that they subsidise the rest of world speedway... Which, to be fair to them, they certainly do to a large extent... The £400k (and quite often much more) that the top riders get does enable them to ride for much less in other leagues, and put together their GP set ups... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IainB Posted 7 hours ago Report Share Posted 7 hours ago (edited) 12 minutes ago, mikebv said: Its clear from the interview that the FIM are not held in any regard whatsoever by the Poles.. They do believe that they subsidise the rest of world speedway... Which, to be fair to them, they certainly do to a large extent... The £400k (and quite often much more) that the top riders get does enable them to ride for much less in other leagues, and put together their GP set ups... You could say that they're in fact bleeding the rest of the Speedway world dry by drawing all the riders away from other leagues, especially with their U24 league and the imposing of riding limitations. The lack of riders in those other leagues leading to a reduction in their crowds. They're doing the test of the Speedway world no favours at all. They certainly weren't subsidising the SoN and some rider wage expectations are certainly not subsidising non Polish Speedway... and don't forget their "World" Champion who rarely leaves his home country 😉 Edited 6 hours ago by IainB 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikebv Posted 6 hours ago Report Share Posted 6 hours ago 15 minutes ago, IainB said: You could say that they're in fact bleeding the rest of the Speedway world dry by drawing all the riders away from other leagues, especially with their U24 league and the imposing of riding limitations. The lack of riders in those other leagues leading to a reduction in their crowds. They're doing the test of the Speedway world no favours at all. They certainly weren't subsidising the SoN and some rider wage expectations are certainly not subsidising non Polish Speedway... and don't forget their "World" Champion who rarely leaves his home country 😉 It would be interesting to see what would happen if they said, as of tomorrow, everyone rides for the same money as the UK pay out.... The riders would be in meltdown and asking for much more from the UK and Sweden..!!! Imagine the UK promoters reaction then? And it isn't really their fault that the UK and Sweden haven't developed their own leagues and riders.... Both leagues have set race nights, with the Swedes still using the same night they ran on when they got many more punters in the Trick era... And, the UK initially used Monday, Wednesday and Thursday as their TWO nights where they had priority.... .. The fact is both the UK and Sweden have brought in journeymen after journeymen from abroad which took away many hundreds of chances for their own riders to race... Whilst the Poles ensured they developed their own riders by ring fencing positions for them.. I would actually think the Poles may have looked at how the UK has ran the sport since the early 80's and used that as template NOT to follow under any circumstances whatsoever... In fact. Doing exactly the opposite would become their operating model.... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PersonalResponsibility Posted 6 hours ago Report Share Posted 6 hours ago 52 minutes ago, mikebv said: Its clear from the interview that the FIM are not held in any regard whatsoever by the Poles.. They do believe that they subsidise the rest of world speedway... Which, to be fair to them, they certainly do to a large extent... The £400k (and quite often much more) that the top riders get does enable them to ride for much less in other leagues, and put together their GP set ups... They're pushing for their own man - Piotr Szymański - to replace Armando Castagna as the head of world speedway at the FIM when the time comes next November. Who knows what the outcome would be if that were to happen... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IainB Posted 6 hours ago Report Share Posted 6 hours ago 21 minutes ago, mikebv said: It would be interesting to see what would happen if they said, as of tomorrow, everyone rides for the same money as the UK pay out.... The riders would be in meltdown and asking for much more from the UK and Sweden..!!! Imagine the UK promoters reaction then? And it isn't really their fault that the UK and Sweden haven't developed their own leagues and riders.... Both leagues have set race nights, with the Swedes still using the same night they ran on when they got many more punters in the Trick era... And, the UK initially used Monday, Wednesday and Thursday as their TWO nights where they had priority.... .. The fact is both the UK and Sweden have brought in journeymen after journeymen from abroad which took away many hundreds of chances for their own riders to race... Whilst the Poles ensured they developed their own riders by ring fencing positions for them.. I would actually think the Poles may have looked at how the UK has ran the sport since the early 80's and used that as template NOT to follow under any circumstances whatsoever... In fact. Doing exactly the opposite would become their operating model.... To be fair Polish Speedway has been (probably uniquely) heavily subsidised over the years. If other countries leagues were subsidised to the extent that Polish Speedway is they'd be in a lot healthier position also. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben91 Posted 5 hours ago Report Share Posted 5 hours ago British Speedway has two options. A) make sure it is the one other league that riders choose or B ) strike out on its own. Remove the fixed race day and rebuild its own product. Short term the big names will stay in Poland  but if we focus on developing our own riders in the long term we won’t be as reliant on Poland propping the sport up as it apparently (according to Poland) does right now. The bubble could always burst in Poland. It did here after all. It is in our best interests to have our own sustainable model here in the event of that happening.  7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikebv Posted 4 hours ago Report Share Posted 4 hours ago 1 hour ago, IainB said: To be fair Polish Speedway has been (probably uniquely) heavily subsidised over the years. If other countries leagues were subsidised to the extent that Polish Speedway is they'd be in a lot healthier position also. The UK had over TWENTY MILLION quid from Sky alone... That's a fair old "subsidy".... Yet, here we are with the current situation... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YeOldPitGate Posted 3 hours ago Report Share Posted 3 hours ago 39 minutes ago, mikebv said: The UK had over TWENTY MILLION quid from Sky alone... That's a fair old "subsidy".... Yet, here we are with the current situation... As much as that Mike, I know Terry had his dues and the number one's had a good go at the trough but where did all the rest go ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1 valve Posted 3 hours ago Report Share Posted 3 hours ago 15 minutes ago, YeOldPitGate said: As much as that Mike, I know Terry had his dues and the number one's had a good go at the trough but where did all the rest go ? The majority went on riders pay. Some of it went to promoters in the form of profits. nothing was spent on developing the sport or the facilities.  2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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