Putting The House In Order (and other things)

ITEM: Well, we're halfway through the Elite League play-off semi-finals, and the favourites in each tie look like they're in pole position to progress to the final. Assuming nothing untoward happens in the second legs (and you can never be sure, certainly where one of the participants is concerned), we'll have a decider in which both finalists have had very public money problems. Is this what the sport has come to, the problems that have been plaguing us for the past decade finally come home to roost? Well, yes. And no.

I've been a very vocal critic of what Birmingham have done this year, how they've achieved their success, and at what cost. Put simply, it stinks. They over-reached themselves, paying over the odds to attract riders that other clubs would have found team spots for at lower rates, and left a trail of debts behind them as long as Sheffield's tail. People have suggested/mitigated/pretended to themselves that this is a case of speculate to accumulate, but it is nothing of the sport. It is blatant financial mismanagement, and is anything but fair.

Allowed to happen unchecked and uncensured, it sets a terrible precedent - why budget according to what you can afford now when the rules clearly allow you to pay later, if at all? Rival teams are powerless, having to accept IOUs (which accrue interest, as if that were any consolation), and hang them if they're foolish enough to have budgeted for any money they might be owed by such a cowboy operation (such as in the case of an SCB-mandated transfer fee going unpaid because you've decide can't afford it, after all).

If you or I were owed several months' wages, we may stop turning up to work but riders that are owed money have traditionally found themselves in hot water for refusing to ride without it. There's very much a "them and us" when it comes to that sort of thing, and since Shane Parker decamped back to Oz there's been nothing in the way of rider representation that might fix it, however badly needed.

I haven't been so hard on Swindon, however. There are a few reasons for that, not least because I've always found the management there easy to approach and genuine in their application, as opposed to the Birmingham promotion's spiky aggression and nice-but-dim sob stories. (Oh, this is where I mention Phil Morris, who has stayed professional despite the house of cards tumbling down around him. That do, Phil?) But aside from differences in PR, I honestly believe the two cannot be compared.

Birmingham have spent money they haven't got, and - unless they get bumper crowds over the next few weeks - may not get. Their unpaid bills have had a knock-on effect, stretching other clubs, Swindon amongst them. By contrast, the Robins appear to have a cashflow issue, one that has been stemmed by an input of cash from the club's two main sponsors, Excalibur and Pebley Beach. Selco, the Brummies' main sponsor, seem unwilling, or unable, to do the same thing.

Swindon had money problems in 2011 that left a good number of riders and other parties owed thousands of pounds. Although it was before I began writing this blog, I was openly criticial of their affairs, but even then understood there were reasons for it. It was on the back of two terrible seasons, propping up the league and with crowds that very much reflected that. Those fans are slowly coming back, and the success of the last two season will have been budgeted for with that in mind. At Perry Barr, however, they seem to have accounted for fans that were never there, and are never going to be there. If it weren't so sad, it would be funny.

Whatever the reasons, and however they can be explained away, the 2013 EL title will be fought over by two clubs who, if they were taking part in a competition with any balls, might have found themselves forced to cut costs (and therefore hire lower scoring riders) or subject to points deductions. As it is, one of them will most likely be champion. Pause for thought.

But! It's not all bad news. As far as I'm aware (and, as always, right of reply to anyone who knows differently), several clubs will end the season in good financial shape, and some of those that have over-reached have sugar-daddies or incredibly generous sponsors to fill that gap. However, the Elite League can't rest on its laurels. A competition is only as strong as its weakest team, and a proper structure has to be put in place to ensure that ten - or eleven, or twelve - clubs can afford to compete on a level playing field, and sanctions introduced for any that break that structure, either through ambition or negligence.

Only then can our champions actually be deserving of the name.

ITEM: Okay, something positive. If you've got a big heart, if not deep pockets, this weekend is an opportunity to give something back to speedway, and to those who entertain us, especially at the lower levels of the sport.

On Saturday night, at Berwick's Shielfield Park, the Bandits will take on Sheffield Tigers (with some special guests on both sides), with all the proceeds going to help Ricky Ashworth through what will no doubt be a petty sticky period in his life. For those of you who don't know, Ashworth crashed heavily whilst riding for Berwick at Scunthorpe on August 2nd and has been in a coma ever since, although there have been encouraging signs that he is on the road to recovery.

The Bandits' landlords, Berwick Rangers Supporters' Club, have given them the stadium rent-free, and all riders and officials are donating their time to the cause. If you are anywhere near that part of the country on Saturday night, you could do worse than drop in and be entertained for a couple of hours whilst giving money to a very deserving cause. The admission fee is a minimum donation of £13 - feel free to give more if you can afford it but don't feel guilty if you can't, just showing up says more than any grand gesture ever could.

On the same night, and in a more central location, there's another event that deserves your attention and support. The second Midland Development League Riders' Championship is taking place at Leicester's Jordan Road Surfacing Stadium, and features sixteen of the sport's unsung heroes and future stars racing for nothing but the love of the game.

The MDL is in its third year of operation, and has played its part in bringing through talent for the National League and, you would hope, beyond. Ten of last year's field have had team spots in the NL this season, last year's runner-up (Ollie Greenwood) has had over a dozen outings at Premier League level, and you wouldn't bet against the same being said of a good number of this year's finalists in a year's time.

There are still some opportunities for sponsorship open (at a very basic level of financial support) but if you'd rather just watch some of the most exciting and ambitious youngsters sliding their way onto the speedway ladder, then it's just £10 to get in. With the cream of the MDL crop racing for individual glory, you won't regret it.

Lastly, Sunday afternoon brings us to Buxton, and the Air Fence Challenge. I wrote a few weeks back about the sterling job done by Dean Felton in assembling a top, top field of the stars of yesteryear, and it's no less enticing now. A title-challenging Premier League side could be put together from the riders who've passed through the Derbyshire track, and the survival of the grassroots operation depends on them raising the cash to buy the SCB-mandated airfence for 2014.

Again, it's only £10 in, and you'll be guaranteed a full afternoon of fun (and probably more competitive than they intend it to be) racing from Gary O'Hare (Stoke, Ellesmere Port, Newcastle & Long Eaton), Jan O Pedersen (Cradley Heath & Sheffield), Kevin Little (Berwick, Edinburgh, Coventry, Newcastle, Workington & Redcar), Tony Atkin (Wolves, Bradford, Sheffield, Stoke, Newport, Berwick & Buxton), Dean Felton (Long Eaton, Stoke, Berwick & Carmarthen, Sittingbourne, Mildenhall, Isle of Wight & Buxton), Glyn Taylor (Crewe, Reading, Edinburgh, Long Eaton, Sheffield, Stoke, Berwick, Bradford & Newcastle), Alan Grahame (Birmingham, Swindon, Cradley Heath, Stoke, Oxford & Hull), Rob Grant Sr (Berwick & Edinburgh), Bernie Collier (Middlesbrough, Newcastle & Belle Vue), Sam Ermolenko (Poole, Wolves, Sheffield, Belle Vue, Hull & Peterborough), Dave Harvey (Cradley Heath & Long Eaton), Aidan Collins (Glasgow, Edinburgh, Workington & Birmingham), Andy Meredith (Coventry, Stoke & Oxford), Martin Dixon (Middlesbrough, Halifax, King's Lynn, Newcastle, Long Eaton, Berwick, Swindon & Glasgow), Ian Barney (Peterborough, King's Lynn, Exeter, Sheffield & Long Eaton), and Rob Hollingworth (Berwick, Boston, Wolves, Edinburgh, King's Lynn, Coventry, Scunthorpe & Mildenhall).

With riders who have spent time at nineteen current tracks and another thirteen defunct ones, there should be a decent turnout that should go some way towards paying for the fence. I'm gutted that I can't make it but I will be donating £10 to the fund via Go Fund Me. If you can't make it it would be super nice of you to do that, too.

And now back to people making a mess of speedway, rather than propping it up...

ITEM: There are times when you think that British speedway is in such a ridiculous state that no other country could possibly run their speedway any worse. And then, probably about once a season, something happens that makes you grateful for what we have, and glad you don't live in Poland.

Walkovers aren't unusual in the Polish leagues. The most common cause is because a club, usually in the lower leagues, can't raise a team of sufficient standard to travel away, and the home club is granted a 40-0 victory. Once upon a time, and because it was a sport and results need to be genuine, the home team would be made to take to the track, racing unopposed until enough points had been scored to secure the victory, but thankfully that doesn't happen much anymore.

Occasionally, though, walkovers are gifted for other reasons, and in the top division, often with tens of thousands in attendance, and many more watching at home, such as last year's play-off semi-final farce when Greg Hancock arrived too late to sign into a meeting, and his Tarnow team disqualified (although this was overturned on appeal and the referee banned for his actions).

This year's pantomime occured on Sunday, when Torun - travelling to Zielona Gora with a narrow three-point lead over the hosts in the play-off final - suffered the loss of Tomasz Gollob, injured the previous night in the Swedish Grand Prix. Unwilling to ride with a junior taking his place (with rider-replacement already being used for the injured Chris Holder), Torun sought a two-week delay - although there was no way that Gollob would have made even that extension, they may have been able to deploy one of their squad riders, such as Edward Kennett or Ryan Sullivan - which was rejected by the home team, well within their rights to do so.

Faced with certain defeat, Torun (or their chief sponsor, depending on which reports you believe), walked out of the stadium and Zielona Gora were gifted a walkover and announced as the 2013 EkstraLiga winners, a hollow victory, even if the history books won't record as such in a list of winners.

Although Torun's actions have been deplored by everyone, the EkstraLiga clubs are already in dispute with the Polish federation over what they see as restrictive regulations placed on their business. With league sponsors ENEA very unhappy about this latest turn of events, the future for top-level speedway in Poland is very much in flux . Remind you of anything?

ITEM: I spent the weekend at two championships featuring the lesser lights of our sport, but only nominally so. That the majority of the riders in Friday's British Under-19 Championship and Saturday's National League Riders' Championship are not households names (or even what passes for that in speedway circles these days) is predominantly down to their youth and inexperience, rather than a lack of talent and drive, and both meetings were none the poorer for that. Indeed, much of the best speedway I've seen this season has been at that level, where what the riders make up for in natural ability or honed track craft is more than made up for in terms of desire and pluck.

Friday's Under-19 Championship, held in front of an encouraging rather than blockbuster crowd at Brandon, could have benefitted from a few more accomplished competitors, even at that age, to go along with the half-dozen who progressed to the latter stages. That said, there was some good racing, especially in the second-half, and a turn of events in the final that everyone except Ashley Morris and Adam Ellis saw coming, as Stefan Nielsen repeaed his 2012 success by outgating them both from trap 4 to race into a lead he wouldn't surrender.

Nielsen was a deserved winner, although Morris, especially, can count himself unlucky not to have taken the title after five straight wins in the qualifying heats. All sixteen competitors will have learned from the experience, and several of them have further chances for success at that level. Although we've been a bit thin at youth level of late, discounting Tai Woffinden, the signs are encouraging that Phil Morris and Neil Vatcher (and an army of volunteers helping them out) will soon see results from their endeavours. Despite some grumblings from over-entitled fans expecting to see 16 finished articles, the majority of the crowd seemed to enjoy what they saw and I'd imagine that most of them will be back again next year, hopefully with others in tow.

A stronger field was assembled at Rye House the next night for the NLRC, although a few of the same names were very much in the mix. As it was, experience was the telling factor, as Steve Boxall, former Rye House Rocket and now Kent King, took the honours after an aborted run-off with King's Lynn Young Star Lewis Kerr. That Kerr would race - and score points - for Swindon in the Elite League play-offs two nights later tells its own story about the growing strength of the third tier, and Boxall himself certainly wouldn't look out of place at that level.

Dudley's Lewis Blackbird was third, although he was given a helping hand by his teammate Paul Starke, who waved him through to avoid a run-off with Robert Lambert. Lambert, although beaten into third place in two of his five rides, was a joy to behold, with a beautiful style that will captivate bigger audiences than the 2,000 or so that were there on Saurday night. To see his first steps - and those of riders like him - is one of the reasons hat watching speedway at National League level is a joy, when the Elite League can often seem a chore. If I were to be given a stark choice between the two, it would be no choice at all, and I think that Dudley and Mildenhall fans will miss it hugely when they make the inevitable step up into a higher league.

As it is, I'm lucky to be able to see speedway at all levels in this country, with tracks within easy reach offering a smorgasbord of racing action. You can keep your Grands Prix, your World Cups, and your Zlata Prilbas, I'm backing British. As Alan Partridge would say, "Join Me!"

The Rush For The Play-offs (and other things)

ITEM: All our leagues stuttered to some sort of climax, at least of part one of the campaign (the bit made redundant by everything that comes after it) at any rate, and it’s the usual story of not quite getting it right.

All four (if we include the MDL) leagues still have fixtures outstanding after the cut-off date to decide play-offs, despite the season opening on March 10^th, twenty-seven weeks ago. And all this in a summer when we’ve had some glorious weather, with a below-average number of rain-offs!

Still, at least the National League and, just about, the Elite League managed to race all relevant fixtures, unlike the Premier League where Leicester have missed out on the play-offs because Rye House and Redcar have yet to complete their fixtures. Sound odd? It’s because if Redcar were to get heavily beaten at Rye, their points difference would have seen Leicester progress ahead of them. As it is, Uncle Len’s itchy call-off finger has done them a favour, although they may have avoided defeat by the margin required in the end, anyway.

The play-offs were foisted upon the Elite League by Sky, eager for a season-ending blockbuster. They were adopted in the other leagues, I assume, as a way of extending interest in a season which might have runaway leaders. There’s nothing wrong with a play-off system – most sports utilise them to decide their champions, with football being the exception (a big enough sell in its own right to avoid the pressures of television, and with an ingrained fanbase that treats every match as important, however pointless it may be).

But few of those sports are as dependent on the weather as speedway, and none of them have such a clusterfuck pile-up at the end, or go with fixtures uncompleted before the vital places are decided.

The solution is a simple one – instead of one cut-off date at the end of the season, have a number (four sounds about right), spread throughout the year, by which clubs have to have completed a percentage of their home meetings. Furthermore, there should be no  league fixtures scheduled for the final week before the cut-off, as a safety feature. This should ensure that, as the season comes to a climax, no side is rushing to complete its fixtures, and that farces like we saw at Belle Vue last week need never happen.

Of course, this being speedway, I’m sure they’d find a way to mess even that up, but in years when the weather is not so kind something has to be done to avoid the ridiculous situation we find ourselves in time and time again.

ITEM: Now we know the teams taking part in the play-offs, I can look back at the predictions I made pre-season with a little smile. Making predictions before the season starts, when injuries or avoiding them can play such a big part in a team’s success or failure, is a fool’s errand, but I’m nothing if not a fool, and so I plunged in, feet first, and if I’d put money on would probably have come out ahead.

In the Premier League I got five of the top six right, with the one I missed out on being Leicester – who, as written above, may end up in that top six by season’s end anyway. I also predicted the bottom two – there was no way on Earth Sheffield and Glasgow were going to be anywhere else with the teams they put together – and win a personal bet with Scunthorpe’s press officer, Rob Peasley, about their lower table finish.

I had similar success in the National League, getting three of the top four right. Who knew Stoke would be so bad? Obviously not me, because I had them 3^rd. I did have Mildenhall 5^th, though, so again I picked pretty well.

The same can’t be said of the Elite League, where I only got two of the four play-off participants spot on. Having said that, Poole’s season-ending 1-7 bears no resemblance to the one they started the season with, and I think if they’d stayed with that team my prediction of 7^th might even have been a bit generous. I had Lakeside in the mix, but that was before they lost Worrall, who would have been a key man for them.

My biggest errors were placing Wolves so low (although even the Speedway Star’s Wolves fan, Steve Nock, didn’t see much of a season for them), and Coventry so high. In my defence, Wolves have been awful away since Ty Proctor got injured, and it was his points that propelled them to such success early on. And Coventry? Got it wrong, just like Mick Horton. I did think that everyone in the team had improvement in them, but Roynon’s injury seemed to knock all potential out of the side and our gradual slide to the bottom is probably about right.

So, having shown just how good I am at this prediction lark, let’s make some more, shall we? In the National League I really can’t see past Dudley making a clean sweep of the trophies, emulating Mildenhall’s feat of 2012. And in the Premier League Somerset look to have just enough to see them over the line, especially if Charles Wright continues his NL form in the PL play-offs.

In the EL I’m torn between who I want to win (Wolves, the only “clean” team in the mix this season), and who I think will win. I think it will be a repeat for Swindon, if I’m honest, and it wouldn’t be unearned after a torrid few seasons before last year’s victory.

So there you have it, that’s my three for the titles. As always, the margin for error is MASSIVE but you’ve got to have a go, haven’t you? After all, if you don’t, what reason can people have for pointing and laughing at you? Okay, there is buying a season ticket for Perry Barr and still being expected to pay extra for the play-offs, but that’s a story for another day…

ITEM: Last weekend was a bit odd, with no speedway at Brandon, and not feeling like seeking any out elsewhere. Weekly speedway at Coventry has been a huge positive in a season that hasn’t exactly been full of them and I hope it continues next year. It’s true that you can get out of the habit of going and all clubs should look at how they can do it, even if it means starting late and finishing early.

This weekend, though, I’m spoiled, with two pretty special meetings on the agenda, both of them featuring the stars of the future. First up is the British Under-19 Championship, at Brandon, with Stefan Nielsen in great form ahead of defending his title.

Although, on the world stage, we’re a little behind Poland and Denmark (Sweden are in just as much difficulty as we are lately when it comes to producing future stars it seems), we do have a fine crop of youngsters, and most of them will be on display on Rugby Road on Friday night. Kyle Howarth has to start an early favourite, but there’s realistically half-a-dozen riders who could take the title, such is the strength of the field. It’s only £12 so, if you’re twiddling your thumbs with nothing to do, point the satnav towards Coventry and I’ll see you there.

The following night I’ll be at Rye House for the National League Riders’ Championship, the big night for the stars of the third tier. It may be because it’s been a rotten season in the top league (and not just because the Bees have been awful), but the National League has been brilliant this year.

Having a team in the league has meant I’ve gotten really involved, and found heroes and villains waiting for me. I’ve enjoyed every meeting I’ve seen at this level, and come away from all of them with a warm feeling about the lads I’ve seen scrapping for points and the tiny amount of money on offer. The NLRC is the culmination of that for me (with the Storm having missed out on the play-offs), and I’ll be there, with one ear also on the news from Stockholm and (hopefully) a British World Champion.

In fact, I might even dress up the car and drive it onto the track, grabbing a random woman on my way, kicking it old school like the good old days of the NLRC at Brandon, with the Miss National League and Best Dressed Coach competitions. Join me?

ITEM: Last week’s blog was the most widely read since I started this thing. While I’m extremely humbled and grateful for all the views, and especially the kind words people have said about it, I just wish it was because I’d written about something brilliant happening to the sport.

It’s still too early to properly gauge the fallout from last Monday – or from the fact that some of our top clubs are practically bankrupt yet still pursuing success on the track – but I’m encouraged by the solidarity most fans feel against the shenanigans that will do more to damage our sport than any poorly-prepared track or contretemps between two riders on the track.

You can only hope that the promoters feel the same way – and I know some of them do – and that steps are taken in the winter to ensure that we can feel proud of our sport again, rather than be relegated to tiny columns in newspapers and no coverage on the TV because we’re a dinky little sport bent on self-destruction.

I’ve never felt less positive about speedway than in the last ten days or so, and have probably taken each hit harder than I should do, knowing what I know and having a life outside of the sport. But you know what? It does hurt, and I make no apologies for that. I care about the wellbeing of the sport because its bigger than any one club, any one rider, any one fan. I don’t care who wins (well, not Poole, obviously) as long as it’s done right. Let’s try and see if we can sort that, yeah?

The Slow Death Of Speedway (and other things)

ITEM: Well, where do you start?

What happened on Monday night will have repercussions far beyond Poole (in all likelihood) making the play-offs. The anger and sadness felt by pretty much everyone outside of Dorset will pay off down the line as yet more people walk away from the sport - fans, sponsors, and promoters - at a time when it needs everyone working together.

Simply put it was disgusting. What's worse is that we all knew it was going to happen, yet like a car crash unfolding before our eyes it was hard to look away. Because of that, because of the fact that it played out so very publicly, everyone involved in Monday night's farce will be tainted by it - from plotting broadcasters and amoral promoters, to pliant team managers and enthusiastic, cheerleading commentators, and including bullied riders, weak officials, and the companies whose money props up such crap. All of them have to wear the stink, and I suspect of them won't even care.

The stench of absolute desperation coming from Poole and the Sky team was palpable. Not making the play-offs, especially after "investing" (or, more correctly, taking a dent out of the promoters' dividend) in several team reshuffles, would be unthinkable for a Poole promotion who have seen crowds of under 800 this season and have risked wrecking an entire sport in the past to maximise their chances of winning what is a token prize at best.

Sky, who still remain uncommitted to any sort of future for the sport on their channels, have been hoodwinked into thinking that showing, and continuing to show to the exclusion of all others, one dominant team will not damage their product, perhaps looking at Premier League football, which has thrived on a small cabal of successful clubs. What small difference, however - for every fan that gives up on football (and, let's not forget, it is a far more ingrained passion for most than speedway can ever hope to be) there are thousands waiting in the wings. Speedway doesn't have that luxury. If one team is seen to be dominating, and through less than wholesome means, fans walk away and are not replaced.

Speedway's various manners of levelling the playing field have always meant that, for the majority of clubs, next season really is another year, full of hope that every team starts from scratch. Start messing with that, as Poole (and now Sky) seem to have been intent to do over the years, and you upset the delicate eco-system that our unique sport survives in. My gut feeling is that Sky don't care - this is their last hurrah with the sport and they will manipulate it to the best of their ability, and that doesn't make me feel better even one iota.

Kelvin Tatum said that this season had been "vintage" but it's hard to see how he could be more wrong. Assuming Poole make the play-offs, only Wolverhampton can claim their qualification is anything but tainted. Poole have pushed the regulations to the limit (and even broken them, seemingly without censure), and both Birmingham and Swindon have very public financial issues, spending beyond their means, however their cashflow problems can be explained away.

But back to Monday, and to those last few heats which saw the best rider on display fall unmolested and a serious crash which, thankfully, resulted in only minor injuries. It was clear to all watching that this would continue until Poole had secured all four points needed for their play-off push and, even if you weren't paying full attention and didn't realise, "Scoop" made it very obvious, stating it several times in the clearest of language. I'd like to give him the benefit of the doubt, and say that this was his own small protest at the events unfolding before him, but I'm loathe - on his previous performances and "editorial judgments" - to give him that much credit.

Once ten heats had been completed (although at no point could you describe anything we saw as "speedway", resembling more my tottering around the training track at Scunthorpe last December than actual racing), and Poole had that vital 7 point gap, a stage-managed and poorly scripted meeting took place backstage - sorry, in the pits - between team managers, captains, and the meeting steward, Tony Steele. For Belle Vue, Jason Atwood remained silent, resembling for all the world a nightclub doorman attempting to ignore abuse from a drunken ejectee, while Magnus Zetterstrom, a Poole asset who hadn't looked interested all night, suddenly found his voice. On the Poole side Darcy Ward couldn't hide his amusement as Neil Middleditch expressed his concerns about a dangerous track - "it's sticky", he kept repeating - losing any modicum of respect he may still have had after the SWC debacle in the summer. Meanwhile, Tony Steele just looked like he wanted to be anywhere else but Belle Vue, although he still found time to humiliate himself further when on the 'phone to meeting referee and nominated moppet, Graham Flint, by telling him that "the damp is coming out of the track" like that was a real thing.

It was then left to the broadcast team to mop up the vomit that had been spewed all over our sport, and they still found time to interview Matt Ford, who - of course - had expressed his concern at the dangerous conditions on track all night but never showed any sign of, you know, actually doing anything about it. That they remained professional is either a testament to their loyalty to their paymasters or a sign that we really have the wrong people in such important jobs.

Social media had exploded long before the end of the meeting, as it is wont to do. But rarely have I seen such anger and such a hopelessness for the future infused in every tweet, post, or text message I read. Promoters, team managers, riders, and fans all stood united, for only the second time I can remember. The first time involved the death of someone greatly loved in speedway, a poor omen for the future of the sport. What's worse is that some riders who have had suffered very serious, life-changing injuries could be counted amongst the host. If they are of the opinion that something is dangerous, I'd say they probably know.

For some fans it was the final straw. For most of us, we'll hang on in because what else would we do with our summer evenings? And perhaps this is the problem. If we walk away, we kill the sport we love. If we stay, we have no say in how it is run. It's a horrible Catch 22 situation, and one that will not be changed in the near future, perhaps until the sport has been brought right down to amateur level and built back up. None of us wants to see that happen but the promoters - custodians, not owners of the sport - need to realise it's an increasingly likely proposition.

So what happens now? Poole - with their chief pornmeister in spin mode on the British Speedway Forum and their team manager gloating on Twitter (even going so far - and this is the TeamGB manager, remember, to tell fans that them walking away from the sport is "no great loss") - will get the prize they have long sought, but may find it less valuable than they thought. The sport's authorities will pretend that nothing untoward has happened, as they did when Poole broke the rules and called off their meeting with a rampant Lakeside earlier this season, and stumble blindly towards oblivion. Sky will take their money and run, leaving a damaged product behind them, with no remorse or compensation for the destruction they have caused, and the rest of us will pick up the pieces and try and regain some love for our tarnished sport.

I'm still angry about what happened. I'm still sad. I might need a winter to get over it. But it's a long winter, and there's a change coming, if the promoters want it. What happens next will decide if most of us are still here in March.

ITEM: And now for something positive... On Sunday September 29th, Buxton are staging a fundraising meeting towards getting the money to buy an airfence for the Hi-Edge circuit. Earlier this season, the SCB mandated that all tracks staging competitive speedway in the UK had to have an "Additional Protective Device", usually taking the form of an air- or foam-fence.

For most of the dozen or so tracks that don't already have such devices, it's going to be hard to raise the cash to upgrade their facilities to the level demanded. For a track like Buxton, which exists on thin air and the good graces of a small, dedicated team of volunteers and well-wishers, it is nigh-on impossible. However, hope springs eternal, and amongst the plans to raise the funds needed was a gem of an idea from former Hitman Dean Felton.

With some gentle nudging and probably the promise of a few beers, Felton has put together a field of former stars of the sport, with a little something for everyone. Alongside 1980s National League giants such as Martin Dixon and Ian Barney, and entertainers from the same era like Gary O'Hare and Rob Grant, he's secured the services of two former world champions - Jan O. Pedersen and Sam Ermolenko - and can expect a big turnout from (fairly) local Cradley and Wolverhampton fans. As a Coventry fan of a twenty-odd year vintage, it's good to see Andy Meredith's name in the field, back on a bike after a career-ending injury and hopefully up for riding even a tenth as fast as that day he beat Hans Nielsen around Brandon.

The key thing here is fun. Fun and a very good cause. Buxton has been the training ground for Premier League Riders Championship winners and TeamGB internationals, as well as the odd Aussie international making their first steps in league speedway. It's a facility that, for its beauteous surroundings alone, we can't afford to lose.

I hope, if you've no plans that or at least plans you can easily cancel, you'll get along and support Dean's efforts. Even if you can't, chuck a tenner into the fund at gofundme.com/buxton-air-fence-fund. You'd only spend it on sweets and pop otherwise...

ITEM: So, after a terrible Slovenian Grand Prix, Tai Woffinden needs just a handful of points to secure the world title, and will be the first British world champion since Mark Loram in 2000, the only one of the Grand Prix era.

Much has been written of Woffinden's change of attitude this season, most of it surrounding his fitness regime (mocked, however kind-heartedly, by Australian rivals who trail in his wake), but I'd wager it's a change in how he handles himself off the track that will pay the richest dividends for the Lincolnshire-born racer.

I wrote Tai off earlier this season, predicting a basement finish, probably because I just didn't like him more than honest appraisal of his talents. I can't say he's totally won me around, or that I'll get behind him in the same way I will some of the other British riders, but he's certainly entered that neutral zone of me not particularly being bothered by him (other than those ear plug things), and that's a sea change.

Not that he cares, but if he does take the title in Stockholm or Torun, I will congratulate him and celebrate a British world champion. None of us should be afraid to admit when we're wrong, and Tai - through hard work towards his goal - has begun to win me over. No-one expected him to win the title, or probably even finish in the top six, but he's stuck to his task admirably. He deserves everything he gets.

Now as to whether a British world champion could create more problems than it solves... that's for another day!

ITEM: I make lots of plans. Most of them never come off. This isn't always my fault but it mostly is. However, it doesn't stop me making more plans. My latest one is a review of the season. Which isn't too ambitious, right? But I need YOU to help me...

What I'm looking for is a set of responses, ideally one per club, to a short list of questions - How did your club do? Best & Worst Visitors? etc - and I'll put them all together and we'll get some sort of picture of the season, as viewed by us, the fans. If you fancy helping, contact me at alan.boon@gmail.com or on twitter (@alan_boon). You know you want to...

Why, Sky? (and other things)

ITEM: Did you enjoy last night's televised encounter from Wimborne Road? Unless you're the most diehard, blinkered Pirates fan, I very much doubt it. Even when the competition has been somewhat closer than last night's mauling of Lakeside, the action from Wimborne Road has been less than exciting this season, and we've had plenty of chances to witness it - last night's meeting was the FIFTH to come from Poole, and the seventh to feature a team who currently lie in fifth place in the table. Meanwhile, long-time table toppers Wolves and Swindon have only welcomed Sky once each this year, despite Monmore Green perennially being voted the best track in the Elite League. Coventry, Eastbourne, and Belle Vue have also hosted the television cameras just the once, which (regardless of whether Sky switch next week's action to Belle Vue from Swindon) leaves 40% of the Elite League one meeting short of Sky's promise of 2 televised meetings per season. Still, we should be grateful, eh?

Except that, valuable injection of cash aside, what benefit does Sky actually bring to the sport? Mainstream exposure is a good thing for any sport - look at the profile of cycling since Bradley Wiggins won the Tour de France - but with televised Elite League meetings seemingly randomly scheduled, skipping weeks and switching days, who is tuning in that hasn't got access to a copy of the Speedway Star or a log-in on the British Speedway Forum? To watch Sky Sports News you'd think that speedway doesn't exist - even during the massive story that was the winter of discontent we were treated to very occasional updates, delivered late at night, and revealing very little. Every other sport carried by Sky, and even those the channel does not have the rights for, is pored over in minute detail on the news channel, desperate to fill 24 hours a day, yet speedway is ignored - its best chance of attracting an outside audience editorially overlooked.

And even those broadcasts we tune into every Monday (or Wednesday, or every third Monday, or the last Wednesday in a month when you can eat oysters...) are becoming increasingly like parody. Every episode is a love-in with everything to do with Poole speedway (particularly Darcy Ward and Greg Hancock), with every story examined as to how it will affect the Pirates on the south coast. Reacting on Twitter to (much deserved) criticism of this approach, "Scoop" (who I can only assume earned that nickname on the pick & mix counter at Woolworths, such is his aversion to anything resembling journalism, never wavering from the official line) claimed it was an editorial decision he took to focus on winners - the logical extension of which implies that everyone but Ward, Holder, Hancock, and Woffinden (in the Grands Prix on Eurosport) is a loser. However Pearson may seek to justify it, it is lazy presentation which does nothing to create the stars a sport short on them desperately needs. The power of television, as proved by every reality show, is that it can create bankable celebrities, even if only in the very short term. What little exposure we have could and should be used to this purpose, advertising meetings up and down the country, discussing the talking points in the sport, and building up the minor players as very much major players.

Without this kind of assistance, and with what they have been presenting of late being very much - as someone on Twitter coined it - a #PirateWank, British speedway's involvement with Sky does nothing more for the sport than bring in cash (although even that seems to have been late to arrive), and it's increasingly hard to work out whether that injection of currency is actually a good thing, disappearing as it seems to have into the pockets of riders, and probably then into the swollen coffers of the engine tuners. It may just be that a little less money-for-nothing coming into the sport may actually be a positive catalyst, and lead to a realisation that we cannot continue to pay out what we have been, sums that have almost bankrupted one club this season and threaten the existence of many more.

The alternatives to Sky are not obvious. Eurosport have little in the way of production facilities, and ESPN have been swallowed up by BTSport, a new player and rival to Sky, who may be an option at some point, although there has been little indication they even know what speedway is. Another option would be webcasts - SpeedwayTV opened its doors this weekend, bringing us English commentary for the Polish play-offs, and I'm sure more than one promoter will have an eye on how successful it is. Pricing is obviously an issue, but the SpeedwayTV model of around £20 for a month's coverage (for 2 or 3 live meetings a week, plus access to highlights from other meetings) seems about right.

Sky haven't yet indicated whether they will renew the TV deal, which expires at the end of this season. The prevailing thought is they are unwilling to commit until they know the format of the 2014 season, but the format of the 2014 season cannot properly be decided until the BSPA know whether Sky will commit. An impasse, then, with no sense of impending climax. If only the same could be said for "Scoop" - I get the feeling of an impending climax every time he commentates on a Darcy Ward race...

ITEM: I made the plunge this week and switched from fan to sponsor, even if only in the most minor fashion. To reward the young lads for a season of Midland Development League action (of variable quality, but never less than welcome), I've sponsored the two Coventry representatives in the MDLRC at Leicester, on September 28th. It's not a massive sum - £10 per rider - but it's my little way of giving something back to novices making that first step (hopefully) to stardom.

There are opportunities of this sort all over our sport, particularly for those who really need it. I know that fans of the Dudley Heathens, although they may take the sport far too seriously for the level they're operating at, have been extremely generous with sponsporship for their riders, allowing them to buy better equipment which has aided their development. The great strides made by the likes of Lewis Blackbird, Paul Starke, Lewis Kerr, and others this season would most likely not have been possible without this kind of support, and it's not just for wealthier fans. By banding together, as I know some Heathens' fans have done, a small amount from a few individuals adds up to a significant amount presented as a lump sum.

Events such as the MDLRC present a straightforward opportunity to hand over some cash - alongside the sponsorship of individual riders (and there are still openings available for that, by the way!) you can also sponsor races, race jackets, and all manner of other things. With the event co-ordinator acting as a (hopefully!) trustworthy middleman, the sponsorship gets to those who need it, in the form of vouchers to be spent at the supplies van. But this is by no means the only way to do it - if you are interested in this sort of thing, chat to riders, their mechanics, team managers, and promoters, and see what you can do.

I don't earn a lot of money, and put a good chunk of it back into the sport every time I attend a meeting. But I can afford a bit here and there, and I'm sure you can, too. How about it?

ITEM: I travelled to Perry Barr last Wednesday not in my any hope of a Bees' away victory but because, such is the perilous state of the Brummies' finances, it might be the last time I get to see speedway there for a while. I sincerely hope that doesn't come to pass, because it's a great racetrack, even if riders race there for what amounts to late or no pay.

The highlight of the meeting - other than an angry Scott Nicholls about to land one on a fallen Ben Barker until he realised that the "brain in his toolbox" Cornishman had hurt himself in taking them both off - was reading the latest installment of Promoter Wars in the programme. It's an open secret that there has been a state of civil war at the Second City club for some time, with forces lining up behind owner Alan Phillips or his hired lackey Graham Drury. The sensible ones are the ones who've stayed well out of it, or quit the club rather than deal with one or the other or both.

The previous week's Judgement column, penned by Drury, took a potshot at Phillips over the Ben Barker transfer affair, with Drury seeimgly washing his hands of it, and claiming he had no involvement in the deal, something quite at odds with comments at the time. Drury even promised/threatened to have the BSPA take a look at certain aspects of the transfer that he felt were contrary to whatever rules are in place - the same rules that are usually ignored by promoters trying to sign other clubs' riders after those riders have already verbally agreed a deal with their parent club, I presume.

In last week's programme, Alan Phillips hit back, using his column in the programme to remind Drury that, no matter what position Drury felt he held at the club, Phillips and Chris Luty were the owners, and that was the end of the matter. It was reminiscent of a parent gently rebuking his errant child, and it remains to be seen if further Judgement columns will continue the feud, or if Drury will consider himself told off and go sit in the corner.

As funny as this all is - and, let's remind ourselves, this situation only arose because Birmingham have spent more than they can afford in the pursuit of success - it really isn't something that should be done in public, or at least not by bitching at each other through programme notes like a pair of hissy teenage girls. As always, promoters should think, "What would Charles Ochiltree do?" and try to stick as close to that as possible. As incoherent as his Talking Time programme notes were, I don't recall Ochiltree dissing Mick Bell in them...

Whatever the future is for Birmingham speedway (and I hope there is one), I can't see eith man being involved. Successive promotions have been unhappy with certain individuals behind the scenes and perhaps the Perry Barr offices need a clean sweep to sort out what seem to be longstanding issues. I wish them luck.

ITEM: With the play-offs forcing clubs to look for fixture fillers, there is often the odd interesting fixture away from the big prizes at this stage of the season. A few years back, Swindon staged a four-team tournament with the Robins taking on teams representing defunct clubs Reading, Oxford, and Cradley Heath. This, indirectly at least, led to the revival of Cradley as Dudley, and the success story that has played out at "Monmore Wood".

Sheffield, Scunthorpe, and Leicester have also looked back to the glorious past and instigated a round-robin tournament using the old 13-heat formula, with an accompanying, old-style second-half. Abandoned at the end of the 1987 season, nostalgics everywhere have called for its return, citing the reduced racecard as the perfect embodiment of a speedway meeting. The top riders met each other just once using the old formula, which meant heat 1 was the race to see - an explosive start to the meeting setting the stage for what followed. And happiness, as they used to say, is 40-38.

With an uncertain future ahead, the BSPA could do worse than consider a switch, and I'd certainly hope they keep a close eye on goings on at Owlerton, Beaumont Leys, and the Eddie Wright Raceway over the next few weeks. It might even help with prospective new tracks who have curfew issues. Nothing should be uninvestigated before the AGM, and everything considered. We're at a huge crossroads for the sport and you don't get many chances to set things right.

No Money, Mo' Problems! (and other things)

ITEM: Regular readers will know that there are two things in speedway I really despise: BSI's Grand Prix circus and Poole speedway. So you might be surprised to find out that I went to Saturday's GP challenge at Wimborne Road. Except that BSI have nothing to do with the qualifying rounds (and thank God for small mercies!) and the event was a BSPA shared event, with Matt Ford only pocketing as much as any other promoter. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

I'd planned to go to the meeting for some time, eager to see some faces we don't get to see all that often over here, and in that regard I was rewarded with Vaclav Milik. Luckily for me, a catalogue of withdrawals saw Chris Harris parachuted into the meeting, and that meant I had somebody to cheer on. Still, largely disinterested in the result but keen to see some good racing, I retreated to the bar and watched my first ever meeting from behind glass. Muted sound apart, it wasn't too different, but I'm not sure I'd like to make a habit of it. Especially when that particular patch behind the glass seemed to attract second-string and never-will-be speedway riders like flies to nasty brown stuff, and I bet not one of them paid to get in!

Our little area also attracted the Polish team manager, Marek Cieslak - or should I say the attractive teenage girl sitting with us did! Cieslak was drunk to the point of incoherence - a real stumbling, mumbling man. His drunken attempts to woo a girl thirty or forty years his junior were not reciprocated, and only his "handlers" pulling him away kept it on the funny side of embarrassing. Still, it's not as if speedway has had issues with drunken sexual assault in the recent past, is it, so that's okay...

For what was offered to fans, £25 was incredibly poor value, and when the UK gets to stage such a meeting again they really need to look at making an event out of it - it's a mini-GP in itself, with the lion's share of profits going into British pockets, and to stage it with little or no fanfare, at a difficult to get (especially on August Bank Holiday!) to track, smacks of folly. Still, better than Berwick - that's miles away from where I live... erm, I mean miles away from a central location! I'm not sure I'll do another, but you have to try these things, right? And at least "Monster Joe" was nowhere to be seen, along with the self-interested hangers-on the series proper seems to attract.

As for the event itself, and with the Wimborne Road circuit back to its usual slick dullness after some weeks of unpredictability that either made the track an unraceable mess or allowed some exciting outside passes, entertainment on the track was at a premium, but Danny King (early doors) and Harris (throughout) managed to get some purchase from what little dirt there was, and made some swooping passes on the back straight and third & fourth bends. Harris's inclusion, much to the ire of some idiots, also made for the only genuine speculative fun as the meeting wore on, with the Brandon Bomber, Kenneth Bjerre, Krzystof Kasprzak, and Martin Smolinski chasing (what will surely be, with Niels-Kristian Inversen's redunudant participation) three qualification slots for next year's circus. Harris led twice in races that were stopped and re-run, and eventually missed out on countback, and finds himself in the most horrible spot in world speedway - first reserve for the GPs - whilst the dullest men in speedway took slots ahead of him, and will add little to an already bloated series.

I've railed against it before, but it's always worth repeating - three qualification places for a sport's world championship (especially a sport that has a rich history of just about anybody being able to dream of making the world final) is ridiculous, and rewards mediocrity and deep pockets. I'm fully aware that luddites like myself will never get excatly what we want - the old, one-off world final restored to its former glory - but there has to be somewhere to meet in the middle: that a Grand Prix series can include a majority of riders who have qualified in their own right, rather than limped to 8th (or 9th) in the previous year's events, or been gifted a permanent wild card by dint of their nationality (and how many tickets the organisers need to sell in that part of the world). Am I asking too much? To the people who make a very good living off the current system, yes I am. And that's why things will only change when the gravy train ends. Anyone got a timetable?

ITEM: Got any money? Because if you have I'm sure your local speedway promoter would like to hear from you! Money woes are a staple of our sport, it seems, and probably have been for some time. Only now that the world has opened up, and loose lips can find an audience beyond the stadium bar at closing time, we get to hear about it more and, boy, did we hear about it last week!

Swindon's riders are owed money. Those are the facts. Figures of around £50,000 have been banded around, which sounds about right for the period they're owed for. A simple story, then, but one that hides a deeper malaise. Because, although Swindon are ultimately responsible for paying their riders, parts of that money - budgeted for in the best way you can budget for speedway income and outgoings - are owed to the Robins from other sources, with £20,000 reported to be overdue from Sky. Some of it is owed by other clubs, and that's a quirk of speedway's financial peculiarities that probably needs a bit of explaining.

When a promoter stages a speedway meeting, he is responsible for paying riders from both the home and away teams. The away teams' wages are paid at standard rates agreed by the BSPA, with the riders' own promoter making up the difference. So, for example, let's say that Chris Holder earns £300 a point for Poole but the standard pay for a heat leader is £200 a point - when he goes to Eastbourne, Bob Dugard has to pay him £200 a point scored, with Matt Ford chipping in the other £100. Simple, yes? Clubs have two weeks to pay this money, after which it acrues interest. To put it very simply, there are some clubs that are way behind on these payments, and that money makes up part of what is owed to Swindon's riders by their promotion.

Not every promotion waits for this money to come in - at least two clubs I know of pay their riders first and wait for the money to come in later - but if you are running a tight ship (and most speedway promoters are these days) there isn't always that spare cash to be found. While teams lag behind on these inter-club payments - and one Elite League is rumoured to have not paid a penny of this money all season, as well as being well behind on payments to their own riders - cashflow issues are going to continue to be an issue.

The plain facts are that most clubs are paying out beyond their means. That two of these clubs are heading for the play-offs is scandalous, and is an insult to a club like my own Bees who, I'm told by those away from Brandon, are reliable and quick payers, but have likely suffered a terrible season precisely because they are sticking to what they can afford. Changes need to happen, and budgets agreed league-wide, and punishments put in place for those teams who exceed them. Anything else creates instability, uncertainty, and allows cheats to prosper. And that shouldn't happen in any sport.

ITEM: Talking of the Bees, we're currently scraping along at the bottom of the league and looking very much lost as we do it. It's not been a classic season, with few highlights, and reached a nadir last Friday when we suffered a 70-20 defeat at Peterborough - a track we'd won at just three months earlier. To rub salt into the wounds, Krzystzof Kasprzak - our so-called number one, who has failed to hit double figures on 11 occasions this season, and has dropped over a point off his starting average - qualified for the GPs with an almost faultless performance 24 hours later, and proclaimed Poole to be "like a second home". An improved performance, but another home defeat, finished off a weekend that must probably rank as the worst in quite some time on Rugby Road.

So how, as a fan (and a season ticket holder to boot), do you react to all this? Who do you blame for such rubbish? Can you, and should you, blame anyone? And how much can you take before you walk away and find something else to do with your time???

Firstly, and let's get this out of the way, walking away, snubbing your club and the sport of speedway, is stupid. I know I'm preaching to the converted here, but there's nothing like watching speedway live at the track. Watching on Sky or Eurosport, listening on the radio, or following updates on the internet are a very, very distant second to actually being there, and hearing, smelling, and seeing four bikes roaring around a dirt-track oval. There are many legitimate reasons for not going to speedway any more, but supporting a rubbish team is not one of them. Whatever else they may be, they're still seven blokes on bikes, riding some approximiation of speedway racing, and if the money is there to pay to watch them, there's really no reason why you shouldn't. Caring is another thing entirely, but that's between you and your emotions.

So if you're going to stick around and throw your money at your team, can you expect your say on whether they're any good or not? I don't see why not, don't see why not at all. You pay their wages (unless you're a fan of a "bankrupt" team, in which case nobody does) and you're entitled to your say. Riders, team managers, and promoters are more than happy to accept praise but oddly reluctant to take criticism. You might suggest that this is because some of them are narcissistic pricks who believe they are above censure, but they'd like that even less.

We pay a lot of money to watch our speedway. I've paid out well over £500 watching the Bees this year, and some have paid far more, attending every meeting, home and away. I'd say pretty much anything short of a threat to life and limb is an appropriate response to what we've had to put up with, and I'm probably letting them off lightly at that. But should we be critical, and what does it actually achieve?

It depends if the riders, managers, and promoters are listening, of course, and many of them are not. But if they are, some stinging criticism can be a motivating tool and a wake-up call to a rider going through the motions. And for those beyond redemption, who are clearly not pulling their weight and busing your hospitality? They're fair game. The difference between the two is quite obvious to those of us who've been watching sports for a while, and for a Bees' fan this season the riders who have genuinely struggled have escaped criticism - our scorn reserved for those who are (and let's not be polite about this) stealing from us.

As for the promotion, they've come in for a lot of stick that I'm not sure they've deserved. Mick Horton isn't perfect - he's nobody's dream owner, and I'm sure he'd be the first to admit that. He doesn't have the deep pockets of a Rick Frost or a Stuart Douglas, or stupidly generous sponsors like Poole, and hasn't resorted to spending money he hasn't got, like Birmingham. The Bees (and, separately, the Storm) have been run to a realistic budget and having got his initial team building wrong, and stayed loyal to riders who probably haven't warranted it, has found his team bottom of the league and been unable/unwilling to break his budget to do anything about it. I'll be the first to criticise any promoter who is taking liberties but it's a judgement call, and I'd rather be on the side of right than encourage any risk to the future of the club. This, for some people, means Horton isn't the right man for the job at a club with the history and expectations of Coventry, and they have every right to voice that. But, unlike riders, replacement promoters are few and far between - far better to try and work with what you've got than take a jump into the unknown.

So, yes, it's been a torrid time. But the Bees are still standing, and speedway continues at Brandon every Friday in the summer months. There are times when you have to take a look at the bigger picture, and this is never more true than in times of crisis, which - and it seems like we say this every winter - speedway is facing right now.

ITEM: Niels-Kristian Iversen has always seemed like one of the good guys - somebody you never hear of any trouble with, either off-track or on it. So it was surprising that he decided to go against the wishes of his Elite League side last week and ride in the DanskeLiga for Esbjerg instead.

The BSPA and the DMU, who oversee speedway in Denmark, have an agreement that - as long as fixtures are in the calendar before March 1st - British meetings take precedence over those staged in Denmark, except for national championships. Danish riders have a separate agreement with their own federation that they will race in at least four DanskeLiga fixtures a season, a condition of them riding on a DMU license. With most DanskeLiga fixtures staged on Wednesdays - King's Lynn's primary racenight - Iversen was always going to struggle to satisfy his minimum requirement. However, Esbjerg's fixture list shows five meetings that do not clash with Stars' dates, and so he should have been able to avoid this dispute with ease. Mads Korneliussen, who is also Danish and also rides for King's Lynn, has had no such trouble, and neither, you'd assume, would Nikolai Kilndt have had, if he hadn't been axed for poor form.

With Iversen disappearing for their home clash with Coventry, King's Lynn were forced to report him to the BSPA as withholding his services in order to get a facility to replace him. Swindon had to do similar earlier in the season with Hans Andersen (having already swallowed one vanishing act, ironically at King's Lynn), and the two have received identical punishments. Previously, the sanction was a 28-day ban from all British speedway, but this has been amended to a ban of just two home meetings - the idea being that the rider misses out on his biggest paydays while away promoters are not robbed of a drawing card. Iversen's ban has been reported to be a two-week ban, and thus appears different, but this is only because the Stars have no away fixtures in that period.

All this could be avoided if British speedway clubs only hired riders who were willing to put British speedway first. We know that, on the world scene, our standing has fallen, and we're very much a poor third behind the Swedish and Polish leagues in terms of rider wages (if not rider payments, but that's another story) and attracting the big names. There is a case, however, for unilaterally declaring ourselves number one, and insisting that all riders who ride here have to honour their fixtures, regardless of any other commitments. The DMU, SVEMO (Sweden), and PZM (Poland) have all ignored agreements with the BSPA this season that British speedway should come first in certain situations, of which the Iversen case is only the latest, and so we cannot trust them to abide by them in the future. I'd argue that riders have to contracted to put us first, with hefty punishments for those who default.

Only then can we be sure that, if King's Lynn are scheduled to ride against Coventry five months into a season, all contracted riders will be present and correct, and the paying public not robbed of the spectacle they expect and deserve. As it is, we're false advertising through no fault of our own, and those who are taking us for a ride have to be shown the door if they can't deliver on their promises.

Wars, Fours, and other things

ITEM: In the June 9th edition of this blog, I wrote that it wouldn't be too long before BSI, organisers of the Grand Prix series, and OneSport, the Polish marketing firm and revampers of the European Championships, went to war over the same pool of riders being used for both events. Lo and behold, respected Polish website Sportowefakty reported on Tuesday that BSI had made overtures to the FIM about preventing "their" riders from taking part in the rival championships. BSI mouthpiece Phil Rising denied such a request had been made but it's hard not to repeat the old maxim, "well he would say that, wouldn't he?"

According to Sportowefakty, the Polish league is fully behind their fellow Poles, and is considering a tactical response, which may include either banning SGP riders from their leagues, or moving their league programme to Saturdays rather than the Sundays it currently sprawls across. This would be disastrous for BSI, with riders forced to choose between riding in the Polish leagues (who still remain the biggest payers in world speedway), with a sideline of the cash-rich SEC, and competing in the Grand Prix series. Miss out on the world championship or earn enough to see you okay after you retire? Its a tough choice. It's all brinkmanship, of course, but a switch to Saturdays for the Polish league would allow British speedway to return to some kind of normality, with the big events once more taking place on a Sunday afternoon. And releasing British speedway from the yoke of BSI would, also, be desirable.

BSI haven't been happy with OneSport and the European Championship ever since it was first announced, and at the Czech Grand Prix things came to a head when Paul Bellamy, BSI's managing director, tried to have Adam Krużyński, from SEC sponsors NICE, thrown out of the paddock, only to find that Krużyński was also a representative of the GKSŻ, Poland's equivalent of the SCB. With BSI looking to expand the series - they announced last week they'll be going to that hotbed of speedway Finland next season - there's only so many weekends available to stage such big events, and a clash is inevitable.

For now, it's a split purely along east/west lines, with Poland and Russia, the economic powerhouses of European speedway, soundly behind OneSport, and the Danes and Swedes backing BSI (Ole Olsen, keen for BSI to use Vojens for the Danish SGP once more) gave an interview to a Danish site expressing disinterest in the SEC). I'm sure as the story develops, the various powerbrokers will switch and change as the situation suits them. If it comes to a straight fight, I'd hope the ACU/BSPA would remain neutral, and let the dust settle before making any kind of decision. There's no point getting involved in this kind of spat - if you lie down with pigs, you get dirty...

ITEM: What do you do with a Sunday afternoon when you fancy a bit of a road trip? Well, if the National League Fours are on at Stoke, what else could you do?

I last went to Loomer Road in 1990. May 5th, to be exact, when - in one of our random trips to anywhere that just having passed your driving test tends to lend to - Pete Ballinger and I drove up the M6 to see the Potters take on Hackney. If I'm honest, the place hasn't changed all that much since that last visit, if at all, although I'd wager that any greyhound looking to chase a hare around the outside of the speedway track wouldn't much fancy the steeplechase-like muddy puddles found on the "dog track" these days! Still, I love these kind of places, and would much rather spend an afternoon in a stadium like Loomer Road than one like Torun, for all its modern conveniences. Speedway is a dirty sport, a little bit naughty at its best, and the surroundings should reflect that.

The Fours was my 30th meeting of the 2013 season, and half of them have been at National League level. Last year I did close to the same amount in total, but only one and a half at NL-level. Its safe to say that the NL has been the saviour of a lacklustre Elite League season, at least for this Bees' fan, and possibly others. And, yeah, the Storm will most likely end up as trophyless as their big brothers, but it's been quite a ride, quite an adventure, and has taken me to glamourous locations like Buxton, the Isle of Wight, and now Stoke. The Storm tracked a very much depleted side in the Fours - numbers 3, 4, 6 and 8 in their averages when others tracked their 1-4s - and ended up bottom of the pile, but it didn't detract from the afternoon as a whole, which is one of the better things about following the NL.

The winners - as at the Pairs in June - were Dudley, although they can count themselves lucky that fellow finalists Mildenhall and King's Lynn were missing their number one riders on the day. They were also the recipients of a generous refereeing decision in that final, when only Jim Lawrence (for it was he) and the Heathens fans saw anything wrong with Lewis Rose's blocking of Ashley Morris, resulting in Rose's exclusion and a fight on the track. Yes, a fight! Morris swung an arm at Rose after they'd crossed the line which caused Rose to stop his bike and jump off, ready for action. The two butted helmets as several mechanics/hangers-on sprinted across the centre green to get involved, only for Nigel Crabtree - former Stoke legend now working at the track - to clear house, throwing them this way and that, and preventing a free-for-all. Exciting! And then, to add further fun into the mix, King's Lynn team manager Dale Allitt played pantomime villain to the Dudley fans, some of whom scarcely need provoking (twas always thus), but happily it stayed on the right side of entertaining.

Sadly the same can't be said of the racing, where gating was paramount, and passing at a premium. Still, Paul Starke, James Sarjeant, and Charles Wright managed to getsomething out of the track during the afternoon, and I've witnessed many, many worse meetings this season. If the racing wasn't great, then the programme was even worse, failing to even provide the right spaces to fill in riders' scores, and giving misleading information throughout. It was matched only be the communication on the day, with lengthy delays going unexplained, and while most of us are well used to such crap by now, any newcomers miht have wondered what they'd gotten themselves into.

For myself, though, it was an enjoyable afternoon, in the company of friends, watching young lads (and some sweet-stealing old heads) race for pennies, in a stadium that has seen better days. British speedway in a nutshell, really, and I wouldn't change a thing. Well, maybe I would, but you know what I mean...

ITEM: So I finally got to see the wunderkind of British speedway, Robert Lambert, last week, and the lad's impressive. He took one race to size up the Brandon circuit, when he was narrowly beaten by Joe Jacobs, and then reeled off three straight-forward wins. He missed the gate in heat 15 before stalking Olly Greenwood and slipping through the tiniest gap to join Lewis Kerr for a 5-1. Like I said, impressive.

Riding on the continent every weekend, Lambert is getting an education that other lads of his age (save for Daniel Spiller, another hot prospect) are missing out on - genuine competition at such an early age. It's galling that German crowds are getting to see the lion's share of his early career, but rules are rules, I guess, and that arbitrary line between 14-years old and 15-years old must be adhered to at all times. Far be it from me to suggest that even some 35-year olds are incapable of racing a speedway bike, and that maybe a proficiency test might be a better way of deciding when someones ready to ride in front of a crowd...

Nex season Lambert will be of age to ride in the Premier League but will only be able to double-up between the leagues if there is a change in the rules to allow it. Once again, we look to hamstring our youth rather than encourage them, with Adam Ellis falling foul of that same rule this season. We have a crop of youngsters coming through that need every bit of help we can give them - we should change all the rules we can and discriminate against older and foreign riders if necessary! The best advertising is a successful product, making waves in the media, and - given the chance - these young lads will do that job for us. Here's hoping common sense breaks out at the AGM.

ITEM: Saturday sees the Grand Prix Challenge at Poole, where sixteen of the world's top riders compete for the measly three spots available to form riders for next year's Grand Prix series. The event is held this year at Poole and just about everyone will be hoping for a different winner than the last time it was held in the UK, when an even-then ancient Magnus Zetterstrom triumphed at Coventry and stunk up the GP series for a whole year.

The three home riders in the field - Janowski, Jonasson, and Kasprzak - have to be considered early favourites, although Niels-Kristian Iversen (looking for all the world like he won't need to qualify for next year), Kenneth Bjerre (a maximum man on his last visit to Wimborne Road), and Troy Batchelor (who has covered for Poole's absent number one Chris Holder) may have something to say about that.

It's a solid field with few who stand little-to-no chance of qualifying, which makes it all the more shameful that such a paucity of places are on offer to qualify for the world championship - just 20% of the total places in the series. Perhaps one thing that might come out of the BSI/OneSport war is a more egalitarian world championship series, rewarding current form over historical, and allowing that fairytale title win once more.

At £25 a ticket the best we can hope for is that the racing, at least, will be close and unpredictable, and in good condition Wimborne Road should allow for that. This is the closest we get to the old-style one-off World Final these days - let's hope the meeting lives up to that billing.

FL, PL, Regulations & Tribulations

ITEM: Where to start about Freddie Lindgren! The Swedish star, a loyal servant to British speedway (although, of course, he's gained both experience and wealth from that arrangement) over the past decade, and recipient of a testimonial earlier this year, cocked a snook at his Wolves paymasters and decided to fly to Russia a day earlier than expected for the second round of the European Speedway Championship.

 

The logistics of getting to Togliatti, three hours even from Moscow and on roughly the same longitude as Tehran, are difficult but Hans Andersen, Sebastian Ulamek, and Tai Woffinden (riding in the same meeting as Lindgren on Friday) had all worked out a way to fulfil their Elite League commitments and get to the track in good time for the championship meeting. It appeared Lindgren had too, but a change of heart left Wolves travelling to Coventry with a National League rider at number one. As it happens, the Bees made hard work of seeing off their opponents, but the end result remained the same - no points for Wolves when they're chasing play-off glory.

 

In the meeting itself - which wasn't the best in terms of on-track entertainment, but still a good spectacle in front of a noisy, capacity crowd - Lindgren started well but faded, failing to make the semi-finals, and looking for all the world like he'd wasted his time going there early. I'm sure Wolves' fans allowed themselves a wry smile on top of the joy they must have felt at Woffinden - hurried travel arrangements and all - making the final.

 

So why did Lindgren choose to let down his team and their fans? The answer is simple: money. The revamped European Championship is backed by Polish marketing firm OneSport, who are looking to carve themselves a slice of the pie that BSI have been noisily consuming for the past fifteen years. Lindgren is struggling in the Grands Prix and is unlikely to regain entry to the series for 2014 unless the organisers take pity of him as the token Swede in the series. Therefore, it's in Lindgren's best interests to keep OneSport happy because a seeding into the SEC for 2014 is his best chance of making some money next year.

 

Where does that leave the Elite League? As usual, second best. There have been rumours for a while that Lindgren was looking at 2013 to be his last season in the UK, possibly sniffing the way the wind is blowing, at least for top riders, in world speedway. With the FIM reported to be looking at ways at restricting the number of leagues each rider can compete in, Sweden and Poland would seem to be the logical choices for a Swedish rider, with the UK - despite the earning potential from upwards of 30 meetings at decent rates - a distant third. That's fine as long as Sweden and Poland remain the cash cows they have been recently, and nobody can begrudge a rider a good living.

 

What is most concerning, however, is that Lindgren was only able to ride in Saturday's meeting with SVEMO (Sweden's governing body) permission. This should have been withdrawn once he opted out of the EL match at Coventry but wasn't. SVEMO (and the PZM and DMU) have agreements in place with the ACU that contractual commitments be honoured wherever possible, in accordance with the FIM calendar introduced this season. With the DMU allowing Hans Andersen to ride for his Danish club instead of Swindon - against that agreement - earlier this season, it's clear that the FIM calendar is being taken more seriously by some nations than others. The question, then, is what to do about it...

 

The ACU (or, more realistically, the BSPA) could begin to refuse to allow SVEMO- or DMU-licensed riders to compete in their competitions, for the very good reason that these organisations are not adhering to mutual agreements signed by all parties. Given that, top riders apart, the majority of the Swedes and Danes riding abroad do so in the UK, and that most of them would be unable to make a living from the sport without Elite and Premier League bookings, the impetus on those riders would be to lobby their federations to honour the agreement or switch to a neutral license, depriving the federations of much-needed license fees.

 

It's early days, and the landscape for 2014 in the UK still looks very much unsettled, and it may be that the attitude of the top riders is beginning to suit the aims of a league system that could very well do without them. Freddie Lindgren and Hans Andersen may very well, through their selfishness, cost some of their peers a comfortable ride for decent rates, in favour of chasing new money all over eastern Europe. You reap what you sow, they say - I only hope that's true in this case.

 

ITEM: The National League Fours is one of the third tier's Big Days Out. All eight teams will be represented, and a good crowd can be expected to be in attendance at Stoke's Loomer Road stadium. Missing from the event, however, will be two of the league's top stars - Joe Jacobs and Stefan Nielsen - and all because of a humdrum league meeting in Glasgow the same day.

 

The Premier League, for a second division, enjoys a position over the other leagues it doesn't really deserve. Riders are said to double-up with Elite and Premier teams, with the emphasis placed squarely on the "up", although that's a turn of phrase that doesn't really mean what the PL claims it to be. PL teams have first call on riders doubling-up, even if those riders are assets of the EL team they also ride for - the logic, one presumes, being that they are by and large heat leaders for their lower division clubs and therefore more difficult to replace than in the positions they occupy for their EL teams.

 

This is a logic not followed through for those riders doubling-up between the Premier and National Leagues, where - once again - the PL gets first call on their services. I'd argue that this, more than the EL/PL relationship, makes sense. Riders improve by racing against better opponents, and those NL riders also riding in the PL will benefit from the increased competition. But shouldn't that also be the case for PL riders doubling-up in the EL? The Premier League, it seems, is having its cake and eating it.

 

Mildenhall will cover for Nielsen on Sunday, although as their number one rider he will be missed, but Coventry look to be an outside bet already, with Rob Branford dislocating an elbow riding in, yes, the Premier League, and also missing the big day. This will leave Coventry tracking a quartet ranking 3rd-6th in their averages, instead of the top four the competition is meant for. If the league system stays anywhere near the same next season, the hierarchy of priority needs to seriously looked at, with a top down approach overruled by all shared events. To leave it as it is rewards mediocrity and will do nothing to help our sport find the forward momentum it so badly needs.

 

ITEM: Okay, if you've been reading the last few blogs you'll know that I've been suggesting new rules that could be adopted for the 2014 season. I do this with no expectation that they will be, or even that those with the power to do so will even be aware of what I'm writing (although I suspect that not to be the case!) but rather because I - as a paying fan - can see some things that are wrong with the sport, and how they might be put right. You never know - if the wind of change is blowing in the right direction we might get some common sense in our sport one day!

 

* Sort out the racesuits

                    On the surface of it, racesuits are a good idea. Having all the members of your team look more or less identical is good for the image of the sport - how would it look if Manchester United took to the field, each player with different coloured shorts and a slightly different shade of red to the shirts? - but it only works if all the members of the team look more or less identical. With teams chopping and changing riders, and with guest riders an inevitability in our sport, quite often teams are taking to the track with a mixture of team kevlars, race jackets, or those horrible raceshirts (or even, in the case of Birmingham on Sky last week, an oversized football shirt!). There are two obvious solutions: 1) if we are to continue with team racesuits each team must provide spares for guests and new signings to wear until they have a racesuit of their own. Speedway riders don't come in too many varieties of body size, so this shouldn't be too difficult. 2) use race jackets, like the old days (and as still used in the PL and NL), and if Sky insist on black legs, then mandate that all riders' individual kevlars have to include black legs. Or we could carry on looking a bit of a mess?

 

* Put a time limit on meetings

                    One of the biggest complaints from fans is that meetings take too long to run. Sometimes meetings run long because of incidents - burst airfences, injured riders, etc - but often they just run long. Perhaps the referee is too officious with restarts or not quick enough on the two-minute warning, or perhaps the interval drags on. Whatever the reason, except in very exceptional circumstances, this is unacceptable. In most forms of entertainment, you know when it will start and pretty much when it will finish. If speedway is to attract the casual punters' pounds (and keep its own fans happy), it needs to sharpen up on the timing. The referee is key to this, with the two-minute warning the best weapon in moving a meeting along. Not allowing riders back into the pits after a quarter of a lap is also a good tactic, but whatever the weapon used, it needs to be deployed. Cricket has a minimum number of overs per hour that have to be bowled, and teams can be fined for not keeping up with it - I'd suggest a similar tactic in speedway might prove very effective with cash-strapped promoters. Fifteen heats should take no more than ninety minutes to run - with a 15-minute interval, a 7.45 tapes up results in a 9.30 finish, leaving ample time for a second-half, a drink in the bar, or an early getaway, depending on the whims of the fans.

  

ITEM: I have no interest in becoming friends with speedway riders. I don't particularly want to work for any speedway promoter, paid or unpaid, and no real desire to lead any kind of fans' movement. Watching speedway is my hobby, and I find that if I get involved in my hobbies I end up ruining them for myself and others because I can't get my own way. That's not to say I wouldn't accept the same sort of deal offered to John Berry in the 1980s, to oversee the entire sport with no interference from the promoters, but that's more to do with my megalomaniacal tendencies than any desire to work in speedway.

 

I write this blog for my own amusement and because if I didn't I'd explode through frustration at the tiny things that annoy me about our sport. I also do it because I like to talk about speedway, but rarely is it motivated by any kind of selfish urge to push through my own agenda. Rarely. I have one weakness, of course - Poole Pirates. Or rather three or four individuals associated with that club. I begin to lose all rationality when it comes to Poole, a surely understandable reaction to Matt Fords attempted murder of my club in the winter of 2010/11, and especially when it comes to a rider who should have used up all his second chances a long time ago.

 

I'm not alone in this - across the Elite League fans are sick of the Pirates and their shenanigans, and if you were charitable you could say they are pantomime villains, the team everybody loves to beat, and that having them in that role is healthy for the league and the greater narrative of a season. However, you can go too far down that road and there is no coming back. Instead of being the team everybody likes to beat, they become the team nobody wants to see, despite the star attractions of their top riders. Let me dip into a wrestling analogy for a moment, if you'll allow me that indulgence...

 

In wrestling there are heroes (babyfaces) and villains (heels). The job of both is to get "over" - for a babyface that means having the crowd behind you as you mount your inevitable comeback against the dastardly heel, and for the heel it means having the crowd boo your every move, worried for the safety of their beloved babyface. The animosity the heel generates is called "heat" but there is also such a thing as "fuck you heat". This is where the heel has misplayed his role to such an extent that the crowd genuinely hate him. They don't want to see the babyface beat him because they don't want to see him at all. He is bad for business and won't last long unless he enjoys some special protection by the promoter.

 

I can't speak for everyone but to me - and certainly a very vocal minority of Bees' fans - Poole have slipped into fuck you heat territory. We don't want to see them any more than we have to, which is obviously troublesome given Nigel Pearson's "editorial judgement" of focusing on "winners" to the detriment of everything else, but at least if you only draw them once at the start of the season you can expect to get that over with and not see them again at your home track, right? Well, no, as it happens, because - as part of the loan deal that sees Greg Hancock become one of them - Mick Horton has instigated an annual challenge match against the Pirates, not quite understanding his core audience, it seems.

 

And this is where I wish I could use this blog for my own selfish ends, wield any power I might have to stop this happening. As it is, my power is restricted to not going on the night, even though the meeting is included in my season ticket and so I can't even deprive Mick Horton of any cash as some kind of feeble punishment. I love my club, and if it's a fair evening and the mercenary Hancock deigns to appear, they should get a good crowd and some much-needed cash. But, not for the first time in life as a sports fan, I just wish that principles could overcome cash. I won't give up wishing but every blow is another step towards not caring any more, like so many before me. And that would be a very bad thing.