Shut up. The riders of this one's great
sport of ours do a dangerous job.
Because of this, insurance is a necessary evil, which is why the
SCB statement about Ryder Insurance is, well, puzzling.
The statement says. Please note for the 2026 season,
Ryder's personal accident insurance is now covered by
their federation licence. Example, ACU licence holders
insured by the ACU and not with the ATIS via the BSPL.
Now reading between the lines, the fact that they've had to
make this statement, did the BSPL actually fail to inform the
riders of this change? In other news, I hope Danbury's
nether regions are not too sore after two matches.
Undefeated in one day and then being dropped only in Speedway.
Oh, is the right the right answer?
Yeah. Good evening, gentlemen.
Good evening. Welcome to the Speedway Tavern,
the very first and still the best and the most interactive
Speedway podcast out there. Still says US.
Says US. Yes.
Good job to us aside. Good job.
Yeah, we've got a few more things that you'll will have
noticed adding. You've got a vote that you can
use and we're keeping our eye on that as it's it's updated as you
do it at the moment. Do you think Speedway will
become one league within five years?
I can't quite see the percentages, but yes, it is much
bigger than no. That's well, yeah, it's that's
proper mathematical terms there for you.
Yes, it's bigger than no. And you can find the link to
that on our on our page. Yeah, on the Facebook page.
I have just shared the link as well to this week's fixtures for
the British league, if everybody's missed it so.
And there's also a QR code as well hanging about.
You can use that to vote as well.
It's. A bit different from when you're
all sitting in that corner shouting to.
Get the microphone, but it's just it's.
A bit slick, isn't? It yeah, come on a bit of a away
since then, including we we have now more interaction with you
guys. Should you want it, we can just
send you a link. Just let pop it.
Let us know on the on the share box and we'll we will send you a
link and you can actually join in on your computer or on your
tablet or on your telephone. Telephone your smartphone my
life. And according to Chris on your
Bungo, we'd like to see that. So yeah, if you've got something
that you'd like to add or, or just want to shout at us, that's
OK as well. We'll drop you a link and you
can join in. We would love, love that to
happen. OK, shall we start off with the
Bellevue Leicester matches yesterday?
Why not sort of went the way we thought.
Yeah, I, I think so. I think Bellevue had done the
job really in the on the afternoon, didn't know, but up
in Manchester in Leicester at times maybe looked like they
were pulling away yesterday, but obvious begin strength really
just get them through and so Bellevue into the next round of
the competition. Yeah, I mean, I was just looking
at the some of them trying, desperately trying to get it up.
I was looking at some of the scores yesterday and from the
first leg. I mean it, it says it all,
doesn't it really? When you see the the scores of
the, the, the Leicester team, they got one rider score in, I
think it was 13 points and the next rider had I've got that
right. That's that's.
Yeah, something along those lines, wasn't it?
So it was yeah, tough. It was always, I think Bellevue
were always going to be strong, aren't they?
I mean, I mean we said this last week, didn't we?
People say Bellevue, I've got a higher advantage, they have got
a higher advantage, definitely got an advantage in terms of the
knowing the setups the that they use so.
I've got the scores in front of me now.
So Ryan Douglas scored 13 for Leicester at Bellevue.
And then which does well there though, yeah, which does well at
Bellevue. Then the second highest was Nick
Morris 4 + 1 Carl Howarth 4 + 1 Sam Masters, 4, Dan Thompson 3 +
3 Drew Kemp and Joe Thompson. Yeah.
You would have expected, I mean it it, you know, I think we most
people expected Bellevue to be comfortable in that one there.
But you would have really looking at some of the roles in
the Leicester same you'd expected them to perform a
little bit better than that. They'll be hoping that's just a
few early season tailing problems that they've got to try
and sort out. They obviously did much better
in the second leg and beat Bellevue by 10 points, which
possibly after seeing the the results at Bellevue, you might
think actually I did quite well there.
Well, again you look at the Bellevue scores and on the 2nd
and the second, exactly 17, one Peter Gelderman 10, Jonas
Yepperson 6, Tom Brennan three and one Zac Cook 3, Will Cairns
1. So Cisco failed to score.
So not totally dissimilar Bellevue very dependent on on
one man, one man who a lot of people would think doesn't ride
a lot less to that well, but he rode it well yesterday.
So he's had a good start to the season.
He's had a hell of a start, hasn't he?
Unbeaten over the two legs, as we mentioned earlier.
Well, it's sort of Bellevue really flex their muscles there
and showing the rest of the league what they're up against,
I think. I think they've shown that they
are serious contenders to win what is ultimately A watered
down and short league this season so.
No, no, let's keep it positive. OK.
So we, we was also looking at we might, we might as well talk
about this now. We've got a new feature that we
want to start next week. So what we're going to do each
week is take a look at a particular track and we're going
to have a look at their online presence and and sort of report
back how well we think they do. Basically with, you know,
Facebook, Twitter, whatever they use their website.
If we get the chance as well, we might be able to have a look at
local press and stuff like that because you can very often get
that online. So we're going to report back on
that because I think that online presence has become more and
more important. A lot of these tracks also do
their own streaming, so we'll take a look at that as well.
I'll take that on board and if they do their own streaming,
because it's not always BSN, is it?
Some of them do their own streaming.
We'll have a look at that, especially if their van.
Breaks down on the way to the stadium like it did yesterday.
Is that right? That's what.
Yeah, okay. Obviously Bellevue, well
Bellevue did their own streaming anyway so they could do that,
but I think the best end fan breaking down on the way to the
first meeting of the season pretty much sums up by Speedway.
I've got a, I've got another feature we need to do as well,
Confession corner, because I've actually got one which has
absolutely disgusted me. Jimmy Jababa.
Jimmy Jababa, I said it's the first time watching this season.
How dare. Well, that's nice.
That's just not it's. Not four shows.
This is the fourth show. Isn't it?
Yes, you think. Of that I'll.
You forgiven. We forgiven, yeah.
Well, Jim, Jimmy, Jabba, whatever.
JJJ yeah, that's where we'll go with yeah, we might have to send
him a link and get him to join the show.
That's what I'm thinking. So yeah, we're going to do that.
But, but this is a 2 pronged thing because obviously the
thing we pride ourselves most on this show is that it's
interactive. So we want your inputs.
So if you are, we're going to go for Sheffield next, next week,
That's that's, that's the team we're going to look at.
If you have to visit Sheffield or you're a Sheffield fan, give
us your idea of what the match day experience is now.
Matt's going to read a whole list of things and stuff that
you can look at as an idea. Well.
What's what I asked to give this is Sheffield obviously have have
done a lot of interacting with supporters over the winter to
see how they can improve their match day experience.
But I think starting off #1 really would be the the riders
parade. Now really for me, a parade
should set the tone of the meeting.
Is it spectacle or is it just something that they just do it?
It's a bit of a formality, you know, different.
Do people prefer the open top truck lap or more modern
pyrotechnic heavy introduction on the home street, which I
think is what Sheffield were looking at doing.
How does the announcer engage with the towards?
Does he actually build up the harp or is he just reading names
off a piece of paper? Bellevue have done well with
that. I think jumping ahead a little
bit, but you know, do other teams need to catch up?
So that's one. You've also got the soundtrack,
so walk on tunes. I mean darts and boxing, they
have walk on tunes for each of their comments.
The snooker does it as well. Doesn't know.
I don't really understand why snooker tries to build up the
hype when once they start playing you can't wrestle the
crisp package in the arena. So does every right?
So does your track have riders have a signature tune?
If you know if a. Rider or something different?
If a rider wins a race, is their song immediately played?
And I think the biggest one for us really, we've talked about
this before, Dead air, is there 2, is there dead air between
between heats? Is the music playing keeping up
the energy, or is it just something that's just a little
bit generic? How does the presenter cope with
that? Those in between times as well.
OK, so there's of crowd participation, that's another
one. I mean the tracks do things like
T-shirt cannons, kid friendly races during.
The interview not in Poland. Half time interviews in the
pits. Some clubs do that, some others
don't. Does the layer to the stadium
and sound system encourage the crowd to get loud?
Does it just feel like they're sitting in a quiet field?
And the fourth one really is the the big one.
Of course, that's the the match night programme.
You know, the physical programme has been a bit contentious topic
racing seasons, isn't it? Because a lot of people now,
including myself, they don't actually buy a programme.
They have apps on the phones. So do you feel that your club's
programme is just a glorified scorecard or does it have
exclusive interviews, high quality photographs?
Do you miss having the physical souvenir fail because a lot of
people still collect programmes? Don't they need to have it that
they're in and it's something that they want to keep going?
Or would you just prefer slick interactive app that updates
live heat results, which I believe Leicester are looking at
now. I think they're developing
their. Own OK, that's good club app
We've been talking about that for years on this show.
Yeah. So there's plenty of really to
get your teeth into on on this one.
And I think riders have to play a part as well.
I mean, one of my biggest, we've mentioned it before, one of my
biggest frustrations, a rider wins a race and then they almost
RIP the foot right off the fence trying to get back to the pits.
You know, doesn't take long to just go around to the noise of
the crowd. Just even if he's just a wave or
something or a fist bump or anything like that.
It's difficult to know because a lot of riders are at one or a
club for one year and then they go somewhere else, aren't they?
So it's, you know, it's difficult for the riders that
they can't get. That rapport that.
Rapport game with the crowd. I think that's the problem
really the Birmingham had, wasn't it, in fairness.
Yeah, it felt like we had a bunch of mercenaries year after
year after year. Yeah.
Do you feel like you're announcers know the sport?
Does that you know, or does it feel like something like there's
a little bit technical larger than they just resort to just
shouting, you know, should their should clubs prioritise that?
Should they have a super phone who explains things properly or
just a professional height man? So there's lots and lots and
lots of things that you guys can report.
I'll be interested to see what Northampton do obviously,
because they've obviously got to build a completely new thing
from from scratch over there. So, but I like the ideas of, you
know, light using the lighting of the stadium because it's a
lot of these things I don't think would, you know, would be
stuff that would be very, very costly, would there so.
Just try and be different guys. But but yeah, let us know what
your match day experience is. And I've said Sheffield next
week, I'm hoping they've got a match.
We should check that they have got a match.
I've got a match that would be yeah, OK.
So and and we will check out the online experience as well.
Now we we may have somebody coming on Ben, if you want to
come on, we would love to talk to you about Ipswich and what's
going on there both last year and this year.
So I think we've sent a link off to.
I'll put a link. On yeah, just click on it and
come and join us. That would be fantastic.
In the meantime, let's go through some of the the
messages. Let's catch up a few.
Phil Taylor says we'd like to wish Toby Thompson a speedy
recovery after nasty crash at pool on Friday.
Absolutely. Absolutely.
And I think this is what sort of yeah, wish you all well.
I think this is what sort of tweaked the the stuff with the
insurance because of Ben Barker's comments on.
Yeah, I saw that. Yeah, Facebook.
So which, you know, I mean the, the obviously, you know, the
statement has been released by the BSBL hasn't.
I don't think it's really clarified it to be honest.
It's just, it's just made people even more.
Confused. It's the SCB that's.
SCB. Sorry, not the SBL.
That's done it, which what is the law to us even further
really. So yeah, I mean, oh, any riders
out there have got any opinions on this that they are allowed to
give? We would certainly love to hear
that, Fred Graham says. Seems to to have some big
crashes in the first few weeks of the season.
Tobias Thompson, Adam Ellis, Leon Madsen, to name a few.
Hopefully things will settle down in the next few weeks.
I think that that happens quite a lot at the beginning of
seasons, doesn't it? I think that it seems to as
people get into it. I don't know, yeah.
That's right. So many a year I remember us
being here saying, oh, there's been a lot of crashes at the
beginning of this season. I think it's sort of, but it's
never nice. Jeff Daniels 10 Tom Brennan was
slightly disappointed at #1 guesting for Kurtz.
Three points a less Leicester that's against Leicester was
probably the reason why we didn't win there.
Also. I have three points at
Leicester. I don't think he's ever ridden
Leicester very well in my. I don't think it's his type of
track, is it so? But then again, if he wants to
be a top rider, he's going to have to develop that, isn't he?
So. Absolutely.
Elliot Hunter. Hi, Elliot.
How are you doing? Hi all.
Went to both Leicester meetings yesterday.
Busy day. 2 good meetings to be watched.
Both teams perform differently at their home tracks and Bewley
was sensational to watch. Yeah, gonna be interesting,
isn't it? To see if that form is
transmitted into the GPS? Absolutely.
Yeah. Third last season.
Of course he'll be open for better this year.
He'll have been certainly inspired by his Bellevue
teammates who are there. An unbelievable debut campaign
in the series. Was it winning 5 Grand Prix in a
row and still not winning the World Championship?
It's amazing so. So Jimmy Jibba Jabba Jabba.
OK, that's difficult to say after a couple of orange
squashes. It would be my pleasure to be on
the show 1 week as a Witches fan.
Another confession on Ben Creswell in the Prediction
League. So is he any good?
He isn't going to point you. He's only done one wakes up.
But I think so he's. Not as good as me though is.
He well. Yeah, we've got that look to
look. For then, I believe we've sent.
I believe we've sent you a link. It's on, it's on, it's on the.
On the chat, it's on the chat there, so if you just want to
click on that mate. You may you may have to copy and
paste it into your browser, but I think it should be clickable.
OK, see you from. Here, we might try it in a
minute. So but but also I think pretty
much anybody if you want to come on.
Yeah, just click on that and we we'd love to have you on Pete
Clark. Parades were done like a route
March in years gone by. Hi Pete.
How you doing down at Buxton, by the way?
Done like a route March in years gone by when everyone had done
national service and knew how to March given the way you're age
there, please. These days the riders just
humble about looking bored. I think that's true.
I think that's true, to be honest.
I've seen I've seen I've been in meetings where the rides are
sort of talking to you and they're just the hands of like
that is if, well, I've just got to put my hand up just to
pretend I'm waving and pretend I'm interested.
I know a lot of them are in the zone but again, doesn't cost
anything to just acknowledge because at the end of the day
it's these people on the terraces that are helping to pay
your wages. Couple of things about that
really. Is that the way they do it in
Poland? Do the riders look interested in
Poland now? I know that there's a bigger
crowd for them to react to and that always helps.
But so, but I think they that's that show much more interest.
I get the impression when I've I've not watched a lot of
meetings in the Polish league, but I do get the impression in
meeting over there they're more like an event than they are in
this country. So how, how much is that of that
is down to the riders and how much of that is down to I know
the team manager or whoever who organises that and says right
and, and, and tells them what this is what you've got to do
because I've, I've never seen, I've never seen that
instruction. I'd say a.
Combination of Perth, I think a lot of the, a lot of certainly a
lot of the prides that I've seen, it just feels like they're
copy and paste jobs from 20-30 years ago.
I mean, yeah, I'm all for tradition, but you can have
tradition, but you can also have stagnation.
I think that's, dare I say it's Speedway in a nutshell.
Yeah, I think, I mean, I mean my, the best really examples I
can use are Birmingham Walls, because obviously they were up
until recently. Of course.
They're the 2 tracks that I was most frequently at.
I thought the Birmingham Pride was pretty good, to be fair.
I think it was better than the wars one.
I just think I just felt the wars one.
I mean, the the interaction with the crowd from Porky at Walls
was great. Yeah.
But I just felt the pride. We just felt like it was a bit
rushed and no one number two, number two, gentlemen, start
your engines. It's always like just, you know,
just get it. Just get it out the way and just
get on with it because the fans want to see the meeting.
But you've got to appeal to all the people as well.
And as I said, I think a good pride sets the time for the
meeting. If it's something that's
exciting and and gets your attention, you know where it's
if it's something where you just standing around with your arms
folded, you're waiting for it to, you know, waiting for
something to happen. Not not a great thing, I don't
think. I mean, I've long been of the
opinion that talking about interactivity, that if you've
got an app as a writer's been introduced, that picture comes
on with a bit of a biography about it.
That's that's much more interesting again, Cos we're at
the age of the iPad now. Kids love gadgets.
Don't. They Dave Twine lets us know
that the best the programme sorry was in the Speedway style
last week. I know Jibba Jabba, sorry.
Ben has said that he enjoys filling the programmes but.
Again. I haven't seen which programme
won from last season. Have you seen it?
I haven't seen it, it was useful.
Well I admin had to get hold of the Speedway.
Starts getting more and more difficult to get hold of it in
Birmingham. No research.
What's to happen for this? Birmingham's programme was
pretty good. I think it's one of the 11
aspect where I think Birmingham were always very strong so.
Dave, would you like to let us know who won that thing?
That would be great. Somebody's telling about the
riders. Just amble about looking bored
but I can't see who that was. OK.
It was peak like we've already, we've already written.
We don't want to give him any more publicity.
Arctic versus Plymouth tomorrow has just been called off.
And Fred Graham says at Glasgow we are encouraged to bring new
fans to enjoy the Theatre of Speed at Ashfield.
The Theatre of Speed, that's it's a catchy name, isn't it?
At Ashfield, we're also encouraged as regular fans to
help any newbies understand our complicated sport.
Now I remember when we did that, I'm going back to the days of he
used to be in charge of Peterborough and then came to us
and I can't remember his name there.
Mick Bratley. Mick Bratley, He started a whole
thing where he they were bringing new people in via 1
route or another, and they had fans that were there to to sort
of help them. So the volunteer fans that would
come and say, well, yeah, we'll show you how to do it and show
you the ropes. And this is that and this is
this. And it for a while it seemed to
be working. And then of course, we all know
what happened with that regime. And whoops, so Ben says he looks
a mess at the moment now. Has he seen us?
Oh no, as you see you there, you could see these.
Parents, come on. OK, that's that's no problem.
We'll, we'll, we would love to have you on anytime or anybody
else. The truth of the matter is we
want to try a new gadget. So that's that's the truth of
everything. Dave Albrighton, Porky Jones was
a good announcer down at Monmouth, got crowd going and Mr
Wolf. Mr Wolf was brilliant.
I know Spike, he was a great
character, perfect for that role.
I know of somebody that would disagree with that.
Yes, I know. I think we've made the same
person so. He he was a little bit Marmite,
I think. I, I, I got the impression
really at Birmingham last year, I don't think his heart was
really in it, to be honest. He had to, he had to work a lot
harder at, at Birmingham because I mean, the layout of the
stadium is a lot different to what it was at Mama.
It was easy at Mama to interact with the crowd because obviously
you could say them at Birmingham, they're obviously on
the level. But also, what was the to
interact against? Oh, we lost again.
Yeah, you know, I mean. It's the one that we'll say
about Porky. He was very good at having
banter with the UI fans. You know, Somerset came, people
like, oh, have you left the tractor out?
Have you left the tractor in the car park?
Is that your tractor and you bumped into?
But he would always make a point at the end of the meeting of
getting everyone to give their wife hands a round of applause.
I actually don't see them being anything wrong with a little bit
of. Banter.
Banter and a little bit of roughage.
Yeah, there's nothing wrong with it.
I don't think that, you know, I think we and, and the Speedway
used to be good at that and isn't so much because.
This just seems to have gone down towards and woke it's thing
now, doesn't it? We don't want to upset anybody
so. That's the trouble, yeah.
Kingsland Knights had a song for each rider when they won a race
and we used to do that at Birmingham quite last.
Bulls did it as well. Yeah, I don't think they made
enough of it, to be honest. I've never had the chance of
Dermingham in the last. Race well Birmingham used to
play Chelsea dagger when at 51, didn't I?
I must have heard about three times in the last five years.
So it's it's. But possibly that's got old in
itself. Chelsea Dagger.
Yeah, a little bit you might be, yeah.
It's getting on a bit, isn't it? That's funny, Darren Reynolds
says. I would love to see an app that
would allow the crowd the ability to vote for worse
performance of the evening, leading to a pie in the face to
his wife style. I'm not sure that you that's
that's a great idea, particularly if it's your own
rider because, yeah, you want a big G in them up and say no,
it's just a you'll be OK next week.
You know, you know, they want to do that.
However, for that sort of interactivity, what why do why
is it always the sponsors that get to change to, to choose the
rider of the night? What about the supporters rider
of the night? That'd be great.
Something like that getting people involved.
I don't think anybody would have voted at Birmingham for any ride
last year. Maybe away riders so.
Maybe. Well, but there there again.
Best away rider of the night. Yeah, why not?
It's, it's, it's a way of interacting, isn't it?
Most entertaining rider of the night.
It could be whatever you want you want it to be.
It could be different each week it it could.
Doesn't cost anything to do it either, does it?
Not really. I just, I just think Phil, with
a lot of these clubs, a lot of it is just laziness.
Oh, this is the way we've always done it.
We'll just carry on doing it this way.
But as I said, you know, there's tradition and the stagnation and
Speedway for me veers in towards stagnation far too much and has
done it for a long time. Absolutely.
Even if you've got a right. I mean, the one thing I think
Speedway does miss is the pantomime villain.
Certainly I think the Grand Prix misses it now that Nicky
Peterson's. Do you know, I was thinking
about that the other day, Yeah, Yeah.
I know he never used to do Lapse of Honour because he always knew
what was coming in the white track, but there's nothing wrong
with it. There's nothing wrong with just,
you know, a bit of pantomime booing and.
It it brings, it puts bums on seats.
Yeah, it's like that old adage of the the, you know what I
mean? Yeah, well, every time I went,
every I know, every time I went to Cardiff when, when Nicky was
in the Grand Prix, it wasn't any coincidence that every time he
was at the tapes, most people had their phones at them filming
it because they knew there was a chance that he would do
something daft and he would get you would get some sort of
ruckus afterwards. What was it that there was a
promoter that said two riders were fighting in the pits?
Don't fight here. Take it outside where the crowd
can see it. Yeah, but but like you know,
it's so Benson is going to come on next week after the first
fixture more to talk about. OK, well, I mean, always good to
have any of you guys and that's what we're all about really.
He's it's not we don't know nothing.
We get all of our from from you guys 9 times out of 10.
The Northampton announcement today, advertising for staff,
pit, Marshall start Marshall, Clerk of the course, etcetera.
These jobs are pivotal to run a meeting, something you just
don't turn up and do. Got a couple of, only got a
couple of weeks started to get all these people in so.
Yeah, I mean, you say you don't just turn up and do, but that's
exactly what I did at Birmingham in 2007 as as sort of on a whim,
I think. Do you know what?
I'm going to go and try and become a cat track Marshall.
Yeah, for 20 years they couldn't get rid of.
I couldn't get rid. Of my training for that
basically involved Grand Drew is saying don't go on the track,
don't put your red, don't put your red flag out unless the red
lights come on. That was it.
That was. That was the instructions I was
given. You weren't very good at that.
I'd like to all the experience of standing where you stood for
one of the practise nights and I remember coming to laughing that
thinking how the hell does he stand here every weekend?
It was freezing, freezing. Because it was free.
Well, there is that. OK, so we we've got the the
results. Hi, Lawrence.
Nice, good to see Buxton starting off well with the their
first meeting and I know they lost the thing, but you know
what I mean. Lawrence Rogers, Edinburgh won
overall, Brummys won cover of the year and the Bulls won the
National League One. There you go.
So that's. Good stuff.
I've always felt that the Brummys cover for the last 3-4
years really has been a good. Birmingham was very good.
It was a very, I mean Bellevue's is always, is always good as
well. I think a lot of programmes that
I've looked at in recent, as I say, I don't regularly buy
programmes as much in the last 10 years, but the ones that I've
looked at, a lot of them just seem to be full of adverts.
I mean, that's, that's fine for getting, you know, income into
the club, but you don't want to do just really a programme just
full of adverts every week. You want something to
substantial in there. So.
I've always felt that with the programmes that missed a trick
because, I mean, people don't buy them anymore.
But if you're an away supporter, some some people collect these
things, but there's never anything or hardly anything in
there for the UA teams in most tracks.
There's nothing in there for. Maybe a, there's maybe a page,
isn't there so. It's introducing that team or
you know, you know your own team, don't you don't need that
introduction, but perhaps an article by the opposing team
manager or something like, you know, just something to attract
them to buy the programme. But anyway, Jeff Daniels
concerning news about Oxford last week.
With the Dogs not being streamed anymore, that was a big chunk of
rent for the stadium. Can Speedway survive there being
the only sport there? Well, I think they have put a
statement, they put a statement out immediately saying that
certainly at the moment they're able to carry on.
I believe there is, there's still some negotiations going on
with Oxford Stadium about replacing the the company that
are doing the streaming to try and keep the dogs going.
But that that is obviously, you know, a massive concern.
It would be considering all the effort that was.
Put in together. Yeah, considering all the effort
they got into getting into getting back, getting the
stadium back, it would be a real shame if after a couple of years
it sort of went back again to being derelict and disused and
we lost Oxford and we can't really afford to lose too many
more clubs unfortunately at the moment.
It's the same old problem, isn't it, of we don't own our own
stadiums. Yeah, I mean most of the the
tracks now that are around pretty much they own the stadium
or they are the only one, the only sport there or something I
think. Especially, of course, if we get
to the situation where England bans ground racing as well, as
they've done in Scotland and Wales.
Yeah, that's another one that's we don't know how that's going
to affect things either. How's the voting coming on I?
Should get it. Up straight.
For those of you joining late, you can vote on Do you think
speed will become one league within five years?
And so far, you can probably see it better than I can, Chris.
So you're gonna read where we are.
I will get the percentages up a second.
There we go, because. Bigger than less than isn't
really great. Still can't see the percentages
but yeah. I can't see anything.
So you're doing better than me. I should.
Work. There you go.
I should work on that actually. About 6040 so far I think it
looks. Like 6040, doesn't it?
Yeah. Well, maths, yeah.
Well, I'll look at graphs everyday at work, so I'll sort
of get to the. OK, it's your job from now on,
then you've just given yourself that job.
So most people are saying yes, but it's not.
It's not. Not over not not.
Overwhelmingly. Did you?
So yeah. Pete Clark says Birmingham wants
something shocker. Yeah, shocker.
So maybe we should come back now.
Just to do the programme. Just to do the programme.
Yeah, Fred Graham, totally agree on the banter front.
That's why the Scottish derbies are so looked forward to.
Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
What was the what was the best matches for Wolverhampton?
Cradley matches? Cradley matches because you
hated each other. Hated losing to them.
I know that's that. We wait to recover to recover.
From Birmingham used to have a variety of teams.
We used to love playing against Wolves because we very often
beat them. Yeah, we used to love playing
against Cradley. Would be very often lost to
them. Eastbourne is probably the big
one, really. But that's not a local Derby,
but the the banks are between Eastbourne and and Birmingham
was you wouldn't believe. In the 70s, so it was cradling
Coventry, Birmingham, Coventry as well was Birmingham.
Coventry was a big rivalry as was crowded Coventry as well
Oxford. I mean obviously we've seen
Coventry stage the challenge made to get to Oxford last week.
You know, that was a great rivalry at one time.
And the banter between the two, the two sets of supporters, was
off the scale, sometimes too far off.
Maybe sometimes, yeah. So I've, I've been at Duddywood
many times and seen that sort of a spillover into fights and
things like that. But but my God, you knew, you
know you enjoyed the damn thing. Not when you're playing against
Craig, because we normally lost that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. OK.
Do you want to I? Just want to see if this works
now. OK, what are we doing?
No, it's messing me about. We've got you've got a new toy.
See. I wanted to.
See if we could see the actual actual.
Percentages. Ah, there we go.
You put your spot on. Oh.
OK, where? Spot on. 6014 There we go.
Oh yeah, there you go. Excellent.
OK, fantastic. Now can you start playing with
your toy and put the backs I like back up?
You know me, I like playing with me.
Knobs just. Me.
So Jimmy Jibba, Jabba is saying something that I can't see.
Yeah, I still can't see it because it went the wrong way.
Looked in the Speedway, started with the programmes.
Edinburgh came first, Bellevue 2nd, Oxford 3rd and Birmingham
4th and which is 11th. OK, so we got the cover, that's
the thing. And Jeff Daniels is saying
something. Porky was great when the ices
were there. Banter to and fro but always
said at the end of meeting Thanks to ices fan who travelled
and a well done ices. 1 great character.
That's exactly what what you were saying earlier.
Can I just say, you know what? I've got got this.
Sorry that you know that. Thank you.
I don't know how. I complied to Perry Ball.
Could you? Could you have been thrown down?
32 page one at Buxton. We sold loads.
It says Lawrence Rogers. Cold outboxing.
No surprise there with a good sized crowd and an entertainer
meeting. Next one, Sunday the 19th.
And you will be playing against who?
Lawrence? That would be nice to know.
Phil Tyler. You're going to look it up,
aren't you? Are you going to look it up?
Lazy Phil Tyler? That's probably why tomorrow is
off. His forecast is good.
Just means no. I'll have to go up go to work
instead of travelling up. Daniel Hughes back in the 2000
Sheffield race card was just a pull out, a three card type.
It was £3.50 at Bellevue but was full of rider profile.
Yeah, I think Bellevue do a good programme.
Bellevue have always done a decent effort with programmes
anyway, so Oh dear, what are we going to?
What am I going to be told to laugh at this time?
Pete Clark said there was always a fight at the Dudley Wolves
trophy matches and that was just the women.
Yeah, I know that's. Big crowd, big crowd at Plymouth
Saturday, certainly the biggest I've seen in years.
A club going in the right direction, especially their
social media output they've been doing.
We will have to have a look at that in a couple of weeks, no
doubt. Well, it's took us 36 minutes,
but we've. Caught up?
Well, This is why. This is why we love doing this
programme. It's the interaction.
Yeah. Talking of interactions, shall
we start off on our prediction league?
Oh, do we? Have to Why not?
This is the Weekly. Let's have a little bit of a
laugh at Webby's expense, isn't it?
Yes, that's the one. Normally it's the laugh at my
expense, but. You've done a lot.
Last year, right? So far joint top at the moment,
so it is early. Days of it my life.
Just a bit. You just burst your bubble A.
Little bit so is this. The table.
That's the table as it stands at the moment, yes.
OK. So if Gordon Gambrill is top of
it, then yes, that is the current table, yeah.
OK, so that number one is Gordon Gambrill, Chris Thorogood, Matt
Buck, Simon Corbitt, Andrew Garner, me, Elliot Hunt, David
Twine and Andrew Green. Where have you coming at the
moment? 17th, 17th TMA and.
This one is. So is this what?
And the other one is the results from last week.
So OK, let. Me.
Get that one up. Since this is your baby, I'll
let you if we can never get it up, Yeah.
I can't read it from there unfortunately, so I can get it
on there let. Me get this one off.
First, Oh dear, this. This makes such good radio.
Sorry. There we go.
Wow, it's. Really colourful, yeah, there's
a lot of stuff going on there. I can't.
I had a few meetings, obviously. I can't read any of it, yeah.
A few meetings obviously about postponed last week, but I think
that's a bit of a sign of the times, isn't it?
You have 8 fixtures for a bank holiday weekend.
You know, some years, a few years ago, you'd have had about
20 at least. Wouldn't you so?
But yeah, Dave Twine, Andrew Green, Simon Gordon and Chris
all scoring 5 points. They all got one exact score
right through them getting correctly predicting Lesson to
beat Bellevue by 10 and I've correctly predicted Paul to beat
Plymouth by 4. So yeah, pretty even scoring on
the on the second on the third week of this of the competition,
so. Right.
So before we go through the the predictions for the next lot of
matches, let's take a quick look.
I bet with nobody's got this ready, I'm saying this and
nobody's got it ready. The, the tables, you see how we
think each club's doing what what's, I mean, we'll have a
look at the Premier League and I think we'll, we can say that
Bellevue's really the one that's flexed their muscles the most.
Well, at the moment there's nobody got any points because
the Premiership hasn't started yet.
It's. But but as far as the matches
that they're completed. Yeah, at the moment, certainly
the Bellevue of course, obviously they've got 4, four
matches. Obviously they've written in the
cup, five points from there, Sheffield with three, Leicester
with two. There's nothing been taking
taking place in the southern section yet, so all the matches
so far in the top league have all been in the north section of
the of the Premiership so. And in the Championship, you've
got to say that Plymouth are surprising people a little bit.
I know they're. They'll be disappointed that
they didn't get the victory on or get something on Saturday at
home having done so well to get, you know, it's within four
points. But red car obviously, it's
obviously the base in Northern. The base in series obviously is
what's taking, you know, precedence over the moment in
the Championship. So in the Northern Section
you've got Red Car, there are two matches with three points.
Scunthorpe 2 from 2. Southern Section Paul, we've got
5 from their two matches. Oxford.
Oxford, of course haven't ridden the meeting yet.
They've had the won the meeting and that was the challenge.
The match against Coventry and Plymouth two matches and failed
to score a point in either of those two matches.
Unfortunately for them so. OK.
And I I think we can't really do an awful lot about the National
League. Again, it's not really been
enough, you know, there's, there's been, I think this is
one of the problems isn't, it's just been such a stop, stop
period of the season, isn't it? So you're usually getting well
into the fixtures now, aren't you, So?
I've got a few more on the shout box to catch up with and then
we'll start going through our predictions for next week.
We've read Phil, so Lawrence Rogers is letting us know it's a
challenge match against an NDL Nomad side of riders currently
without a team place putting themselves in the shop window.
I like that Fred Graham says Daiquan says best crowd since
2016. I presume that's the Plymouth we
was talking about. I can't remember now.
He'll he'll tell us. Weather permitting.
First Scottish Derby meeting this Friday at Armadump and
there will be a big travelling Tiger support on the third bend.
I like this Armadump. This is more of the.
Otherwise, just just to describe it, that is Fred's comment, not
yours. Yes.
Absolutely. I did say Fred, Graham says.
We don't want all the Edinburgh. Fans, No, no, no, no, no Sir, I
should correct you once on on something that you said earlier,
which was that you get at least 20 matches on bank holiday.
I think you're more likely to get 20 rain offs but.
Yes, it depends on which bank holiday it was, didn't it Sir?
But hey ho, right then, shall we believe it's me to start this
week it. Is indeed, yeah.
So what have we got? Well Owen, the first one
obviously was Oxford against Plymouth but as as people know
that is now off. So the first one on the list is
Paul against Scunthorpe in the KO Cup.
First round, first leg. OK.
Well, I will go with Paul for by 12 points.
OK. I've gone for Paul by 18 on that
one. OK.
Have I done mine you? Haven't done yours yet, haven't
I? Nope.
OK, OK, so who's the change again?
Paul against Scunthorpe. Do you want me to make?
An I'll go, no, hang on, I'll go yes, yes, yes, because that's
got to put it up. I'll go Paul by 10.
OK, OK, all right, next one. Ipswich make their start to the
2026 season after all the shenanigans at Foxhall and they
will be taking on the Kings Lynn stars in the southern section of
the Premiership KO Cup. Interesting.
What do you reckon, Matt? I've gone Ipswich by 12, four.
That wouldn't surprise me, actually.
No, I, I, I was, I was looking the sort of 46 marks, so I'm
going to say 6. OK, next one is the base in
series Norfolk section, red car against Workington.
It's me, isn't it? Yeah.
Workington by 10 we. Call that one.
I'm very surprised. I'll say red car by 10.
OK, I've gone red car by 8. So Chris is probably going to
get the only one that's going to get that one.
Of course, yeah. OK, next one.
As Fred has said, it is the first Scottish Derby of the
season and it is at Armadale. I will say Edinburgh against
where's go? Chicken Edinburgh versus
Glasgow's up to you. Get this one.
Edinburgh by 4:00. I've gone Glasgow by 8.
Interesting. Glasgow boy Glasgow by.
Don't look as strong this season anymore but they do always raise
the game and they're bringing to their neighbours, don't they?
So absolutely not saying that Glasgow don't bother.
OK, the next one is the 2nd. Is it uncomfortable sitting on
that fence? Second leg of the Knockout Cup
and that is Scunthorpe against Paul.
Paul by two. You're going?
Yes. I'm trying to multitask
Scunthorpe against Paul and. Then okay, Scunthorpe by 6.
You said Paul, Yes, I'm tempted. By the usual.
Yeah, but I'm not going, so I'm gonna say Scunthorpe by two,
okay? The base in series next on
Saturday, that is Plymouth against Oxford.
Okie, dokie. That's up to you, Matt.
Plymouth by 10. Sorry, I meant Chris, you said
Matt. Yeah, I know I did.
So. Plymouth by, you said.
My name, so I responded. Plymouth by 10.
OK, I wanted to say Plymouth by 10, but I'm gonna go.
You'll be kicking yourself when it is Plymouth by ten and last
but by no means least, in the southern section of the
Premiership, King's Lynn against Ipswich, that's.
The league. The league Champions.
Yeah, No. Yeah, Ipswich by 12.
I'm sorry, who was it against? Kingsland against Ipswich.
It's a subtle bar, so. You said by 12, didn't you?
Yeah, I'm, I'm going to say, I'm going to say King's Lynn by 4.
I've gone King's Lynn by 16. Interesting.
Well, you quite like the look of King's Lynn this year, don't
you? Yes, we've been strung by King's
Lynn before because I've thought they've had good scenes before
and they've ended up not doing so well.
So OK, OK, that's it. So, so we've had 18 responses so
far on to this weeks predictions.
So Yep, so going alright. So just having a look at some of
these graphs that it gives up as well.
So some, you know, good, good predictions there.
King's Lynn against Ipswich, there's a vast majority of
people going for a home win. I think the Commons score is
4941 to King's Lynn's. Eight people have gone for that
so far, so not really giving the witches much of a chance in that
one, so. Slight change in our poll, it's
now 61%. Yes, 39%.
Okie, dokie. OK.
Just just going back really on what we said about the riders
needing to sort of interact with the crowd more as well.
Yeah, it feels, feels in a lot of sense it's a ride of winter
hate. And then if that just peels off
to the bits, it almost feels like they're just finishing the
shift at the factory, doesn't it?
You know, So it sort of kills the adrenaline.
It's, you know, just a simple slow down lap with the just, you
know, way after the crowd. I mean, I used a lot what they
used to do at Peterborough when the riders used to go up to the
fence and do hard fights with the kiss.
Because you know, you're a kid and you've interacted with a
rock, with a rider at a meeting you feel like you've been in,
you've been involved in, haven't you?
Just I used to do that at Coventry.
Yeah, that means a lot, doesn't it?
You know, for a kid standing at the fence, or even when a rider
throws a pair of goggles or throws a tear off into the
crowd. I mean, you used to that, didn't
you? Used to collect them off and
give them to the kids. You know, it's, it's like a
souvenir from a meeting, isn't it?
So these are, I think the riders have to realise that.
My son's dish bike, just from bits and pieces.
They've got, you know, it's building the next generator's
relation of supporters, isn't it?
I mean, I think this is where I think I've got such a lot of
respect for Emmel Saifertolov because he came over here and he
certainly wasn't the prima Donna.
He interacted well with supporters home and away.
I know when when Ipswich came to to Wolverhampton there was a
massive queue of people waiting to get his autograph and that
photographs taken him and he gave time to every single one of
them. So fair play to him for for
doing that. It wasn't just what he did on
the track, it was what he did off the track.
He was a real model professional as well.
It seems to be something that's lost from our sport and it was
one of the things that made it special.
Well, the, the, the, the keys, the key architects behind that
really were the American riders, weren't they?
Because they were great at doing things like that, were they?
Particularly the with the Moran bro, the Moran brothers
basically. I think if the Moran's were
right, you know they'd probably be frowned.
I wonder because of some of their so why from from the
tracks? Yeah.
I mean, everybody go says about what Nick Morris did, but yeah,
yeah, we'll say no more on that. I've I've seen I saw some great
races between Sean Moran and and Simon Mamba, many, many great
races. But both of them would all even
they're on that got lost in the battle.
They'd both come round and and annoys the crowd and so and you
felt like then you wouldn't, you'd interacted with them and I
think Speedo misses that. I think if a rider just wins a
race and then they just tear off back to the pits.
They were always so happy. They were happy to talk to the
crowd. They were happy in that to race
that, you know, there was no. Oh, yeah.
I, I, I, I I didn't get the set up right.
I know I won by 6 sex lengths, but I didn't get the set up
right. It wasn't fast enough.
Yeah. Yeah, they weren't.
Oh, yeah, that's great. That was worse than that was.
Yeah. It was all fun.
And that draws people in and there's not a lot of, there's
not enough. Fun key thing with the American
riders then though is that they all got on, but when they were
up against each other on the track, they desperately wanted
to beat each other. It meant so much to them.
They always, you always felt that they were giving it an
extra 1015% bragging rights when they were rationing against each
other. So.
Absolutely. So yeah, we miss a lot.
I've said it before, but Paco Castano does a little more than
wave. Packard is one of the one of the
flag bearers for that, isn't it? He's very, very.
Good at it. He knows.
He understands it.
He understands it's it's entertainment as well as a
sport. Yeah, I, I can't disagree with
that. Do we have any more?
Have we got any more comments on that?
We are there was at school with Andrew Silva and Len used to
have the lucky 50P at Hackney and Rye House that was thrown to
the kids. You can't do that now.
Not even allowed to throw sweets.
Really. Yep.
HR because you hit somebody with Yeah, yeah.
Not allowed to do it. That's why they stopped doing
the, as I say, the rods hanging a fence, hanging the hands over
the fence, because of health and safety.
Isn't it so? Health and safety should stand
for health and no fun. It's there we go.
What I feel on that one. I mean, I remember somebody
might have been you actually telling me about when they went
to Stoke the one night and it was seemed to be 1015 minutes of
absolutely nothing happening at all.
And if you've got, if you go to a meeting where there's nothing
going on between races, especially if you're a new fan,
you just think, well, I've paid a lot of money to come here,
what's going on? Nothing's happening.
What happened at Stoke at night? And I, I don't think, I don't
think I've experienced. Coventry used to be slow, by the
way. Coventry.
Coventry was slow, yeah. But Stoke, they, they, they had
this thing where, OK, so the fence got broke.
It happens and you understand they've got to put it back
together again. But they put it back together
and then nothing happened. There was no music, no
announcement, everybody. Nothing happened. 10 minutes
later, nothing had happened. There's nobody working on the
fence. The fence looks fine.
Then they announced the riders and the riders came out and then
they sent the riders back because they we've got to grade
the track. If ever the phrase only in
Speedway was born for anything, that that was it.
And yeah, that that dead time that kills people.
And it certainly killed youngsters.
And by youngsters, I mean anybody under the age of 20,
they've gone. They're not interested in the
more they've gone. They've gone.
They've gone on. The phones looking at TikTok or
what they've gone, you've lost them.
Daniel Hughes Riders did go to the bar and after meeting to see
the fans but now they're off to the airport for the next
meeting. This is so true.
The brands you see are to the bar after the meeting didn't the
sometimes sometimes before the. Meeting Dave Twine, somebody
said you're going to have to make that bigger mate.
That's stop it. Making your own jokes.
Somebody said that the riders at Buxton had.
Had their coats on during presentation.
It is cold. It's very, very cold.
In Sweden they go around with flags after the race.
I do used to do that Birmingham if they won.
It just didn't happen very often.
The cleanest flag in the in the. It's your red flag, by the way,
that you I don't. Know.
It's in here, OK, It's in here. The red flag that I didn't.
I didn't get much for it so I just kept it.
One of the last showmen in the UK was the late Danny Ayers.
Absolutely yeah, Ashfield loved his celebrations.
All Tigers riders come round after winning a race and even
the way riders do it at Ashfield due to the applause from the
crowd. Where are the showmen?
Who are the showmen? They've been, he's told.
Not to be sure. That's yeah, essentially.
But I mean score next. Yeah, Score was great.
Score was doing his, doing his downs.
You know, that was the first. I remember the first time we did
that. You know, nobody's ever seen
anybody do that sort of thing before.
I think in the next race, Sam tried to do 1 and ended the
white backside. So, but yeah, but again, you
know, again, it's interaction with the crowd and it's, it's
been a shaman, you know, and we seem to have lost that a little
bit, unfortunately, because the, the, you know, we can't all be,
they can't, the riders seem to always be like robots in some
ways, don't they? You can't do this.
You can't do that. So apparently Jeff Daniels
reckons Chase the Ace throws sweets into the crowd.
Still at the NSSI. Think that's the luck of having
your own stadium. I know at Birmingham we wanted
to do stuff like that because it's not our stadium.
They got undergrounds and got their own HR personnel.
We was told no uncertain terms. We weren't allowed to do that.
We was told no uncertain terms. We weren't allowed to do a lot
of things. But yeah, maybe we should write
a book about that one day, Pete. Maybe we should.
OK. So I think this is probably the
final look at our poll, OK. And it's finished on 63% to 38%
who said no. OK, what did?
What would you have voted if you had voted?
I'm not sure to be honest. Well, the client didn't think
yes, but I just think the priorities seem to be trying to
hold that off as long as they possibly can.
But the less clubs they get, the more the more I think they're
going to be forced to do it in the end, so.
OK, well on that note, just a quick reminder, we're going to
look at Sheffield over this week as far as their online presence.
And we would love to have your race day reports either on the
day or if you want to just shove them up on the shower box or
even if you want to come on and we'll give you the link to do
that, that would be. Yeah, there's no meeting at
Sheffield this way, by the way. There isn't any.
There's. No meeting at Sheffield this
way, by the way. So we can't do Sheffield then?
It's good though, we've had that just I did.
Ask you at the beginning was I thought they did.
So has Plymouth got one? Plymouth have got one.
Yeah, they've got one on Saturday.
They've got Oxford. OK, well.
Obviously I'm going to Plymouth later in the season anyway so,
and I went last year as well so. Are you saying you don't want to
do Plymouth? Oh, no, happily do Plymouth,
Yeah, so. Oh.
God, this is much harder than I realised.
So we're going to do Plymouth this week.
So yeah, if you go down to Plymouth, give a short message,
but. Again, any any meetings that you
go to, if you want to give us your feedback, please do so.
Absolutely, yeah. It's things that you've seen
good practise and bad practise. Can I do this to signal the end?
That usually means you've got 4 minutes, but OK, I'm sorry.
OK. And on that bombshell, we will
wish you a good night and enjoy your Speedway this week.
Yep. See.
You next week, of course. See you next week.
Take care everyone. Sweet White Tower.
White Tower White Tower. Welcome to the Speedway Tavern.
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