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12th May The last ever live Sky Sports speedway broadcast to feature the legendary presenter Jonathan Green simultaneously showcased his skills along with the grave limitations of his talent, his obsessions (too many to list but invariably an endless loop of discussions about the weather, the track, both teams REALLY wanting to win, the wonder […]

Unless I missed it, without fanfare or ceremony one of the speedway broadcasting greats – Jonathan Green – has slunk away from our screens without the brilliance of his decade of live television work being truly appreciated and acknowledged. Surely this is a crime! With a whimper rather than a bang – after the last […]

28th April The Sky cameras have chosen to show a clash of birds when the Swindon Robins take on the Eastbourne Eagles at Blunsdon. It’s a brave choice of fixture given that the Eagles in recent years have rarely performed well in Wiltshire. The Elite League table has an ominous look about it too though […]

If you weren’t a speedway fan and had accidentally tuned into the Panthers versus Eagles meeting from the East of England Showground, you’d have been treated to an evening where the weather and consistency of the dirt on the track almost garnered as much discussion as the racing. Making him sound like a dog needing […]

What would it be like to live in world without inflation? Strangely enough, the riders who have competed in the Grand Prix series know this feeling well. They’ll know this again this year as the 2008 Grand Prix series starts tomorrow in Slovenia with exactly the same prize money on offer as in 2005! Given […]

31st March Sky Sports choose to send their cameras to Brandon for the Coventry versus Eastbourne to open another season of live televised speedway coverage. I don’t know what package everyone else subscribes to but mine costs £35 per month and you have to ask does this represent good value or guaranteed entertainment? For the […]

…then you might also enjoy my latest photo book Banter & Bustle The Big Issue ,the Daily Telegraph, the Sunderland Echo, salut! Sunderland all liked it! They said: “The ritualistic walk to and from the football ground is the subject of this quirky book of photographs. Filled with mundane images of the back end of […]

Robert Bamford’s Yearbook remains an essential purchase..every conceivable fact and figure is coveredAllan Melville, Speedway Plus 14/02/08 The 2008 edition of the Speedway Yearbook has been given a welcome makeover…it’s a good move as the dull-as-ditchwater presentation has been beefed up into an attractive packagePeter Oakes, Speedway Star 16/02/08

26th January I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the Eastbourne fans forum in the bar at Arlington Stadium on a January winter’s night. I knew that the new promotional team of Bob Dugard and Martin Hagon would be present along with the key post-season signings – the diminutive Lee Richardson and the affable […]

Methanol Press SPEEDWAY YEARBOOK 2008 Edited by Robert Bamford £14.99 272 pages Paperback Just Published The indispensable companion for the 2008 season for speedway fans everywhere – edited by respected speedway author and historian, Robert Bamford. The Speedway Yearbook provides the definitive guide to and last word on everything you’ll need to know to enjoy […]

It is not an easy leap from Italian football to British speedway, but it has to be made to pay appropriate attention to Shale Britannia: A Sideways Glance at Speedway (Methanol Press, £15). The title barely does the work justice, for it is not so much a glance as a full-on stare. It is an […]

The F.I.M. has just published the official attendance figures for the 2007 Grand Prix Series. Total attendances improved by 2.3% overall from 147,392 to 150,913 though because many of the attendances have weirdly symmetrical numbers you have to assume that these are ‘rounded’ figures not specific ones. I gather that these figures refer to ‘paying […]