Post by Administrator on May 13, 2011 14:24:30 GMT
BOUQUET OF SHALE
« Thread Started Today at 2:21pm »
BY JEFF SCOTT
BOUQUET OF SHALE... another pilgrimage around the tracks of British Speedway
As the tender buds emerge from their long winter sleep, so too do the methanol-fuelled speedway bikes emerge from their workshops in preparation for another season of ear-caressing and nostril-bewitching racing excitement. Also emerging from his writer’s cocoon, albeit less tenderly and with less noise, is Jeff Scott, speedway author and fan ordinaire.
With his keen ear, sympathetic eye, Tupperware container, and match programme, Scott continues to document the sporting phenomena of speedway with all its idiosyncratic passion and players: the brave riders, enduring fans, obsessive collectors, sharp-witted banterers, Super7even beauties, devoted race-night staff and, of course, the ever-optimistic entrepreneurs and managers whose investment ensures the show stays on track at Britain’s temples of shale. Together these supplicants, disciples and participants resist to their utmost the levelling winds of economic and cultural change to celebrate and preserve the sport and community that they love.
As always, Scott prefaces his pilgrimages to the holy places of speedway by publishing another volume in his continuing series of speedway books. This year’s entry is Bouquet of Shale, which joins his other critically acclaimed works and together they constitute a body of work unique in its dedication to a sport as well as the social and cultural scope of its subject.
BOOK DETAILS
Bouquet of Shale
Jeff Scott
Paperback
274 pages
63 black & white photos
175,000 words
£20.00
Methanol Press
ORDER INFORMATION
Available at all good track shops and also can be ordered via payola at www.methanolpress.com or send a £24.50 cheque to cover P&P made payable to "J. Scott" at Methanol Press, 2 Tidy Street, Brighton BN1 4EL
CONFIRMED TOUR DATES (more to follow)
15th May Mildenhall
19th May Ipswich
20th May Scunthorpe
21st May Workington
22nd May Leicester
27th May Somerset
28th May Newport
2nd June Swindon
3rd June Lakeside
17th June Edinburgh
18th June Berwick
19th June Glasgow
25th June Cardiff
11th September Sittingbourne
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1: Lakeside: “We’re clearly not the rubbish team that the experts claimed we were!
Chapter 2: Eastbourne: “He had such a talent and never knew it.”
Chapter 3: Newport: “I’m not telling anyone what to do! I just advise if they want it! Some of them do need it.”
Chapter 4: Rye House: “No one breathes Rye House more than Chris Neath. Cut him in half and he’d be coloured blue and yellow!”
Chapter 5: Sheffield: “When the flag drops the bullshit stops.”
Chapter 6: Mildenhall: “There are excellent sight lines. Every track should be like this!”
Chapter 7: Swindon: “I’d heard he was, then I heard he wasn’t and Davey Watt was and then I heard he was again!”
Chapter 8: Cardiff: “Michael Lee says on his DVD, ‘The people who used to run the sport didn’t want it to get too big!’”
Chapter 9: Redcar: “Chris Mills won’t be on Tomáš Suchánek’s Christmas card list.”
Chapter 10: Edinburgh: “On the track it’s fantastic – off the track we’re losing four figures every week!”
Chapter 11: Northside: “One of the riders here today will go on to be a star! Trouble is, you don’t know which one! In 20 years’ time, we’ll all say that we could see that today.”
Chapter 12: Workington: “He told me that for the first time ever as a referee he had awarded a track 10 out of 10.”
Chapter 13: Newcastle: “If knowing that has annoyed you, remember it when you go out on the track and score a few more points!”
Chapter 14: Isle of Wight: “He said he’d stop the race in case a rider went over the fence and hurt themselves on the brambles!”
Chapter 15: Coventry: “How many other trackshops provide pens for the away fans?”
Chapter 16: Wolverhampton: “When he gates, he wins. If not, he can’t be bothered. He’d be on the list of riders I wouldn’t have in my team!”
Chapter 17: Berwick: “I don’t know if you remember when riders just used to turn up with a second-hand bike on the back of their car with a small toolbox?”
Chapter 18: Buxton: “You go to speedway but you don’t see old riders! They’re not made welcome!”
Chapter 19: Belle Vue: “Am I Chris Morton?”
Chapter 20: Birmingham: “The future is bright – the future is red and yellow.”
Chapter 21: Scunthorpe: “Everyone remembers the Moran brothers – Kelly and Shawn – but all of these lads are going faster than they did then because the bikes have moved on!”
Chapter 22: King’s Lynn: “I try to watch it like a fan.”
Chapter 23: Glasgow: “It’s difficult, there’s so many other bits going on in the world – speedway is getting smaller!”
Chapter 24: Somerset: “If he saw a lake on the way to speedway, he’d stop off and fish!”
Chapter 25: Plymouth: “My missus reckons it’s because it’s got Devils in the name!”
Chapter 26: Plymouth: “They’re doing a job where they could end up in a wheelchair for whatever they’re paid!”
Chapter 27: Sittingbourne: “We’d had 50 races and finished within the curfew.”
Chapter 28: Peterborough: “I don’t like to eat before the show as it gives me indigestion.”
Chapter 29: Dudley: “He doesn’t turn it until - as they used to say - he can read the labels on the beer bottles!”
Chapter 30: Kidlington: “I still send in the occasional piece to the Mail. We haven’t been running for three years so, obviously, it gets more and more difficult!”
Chapter 31: Poole: “He used to ride with both wheels on the safety fence, like it was the wall of death.”
Chapter 32: Ipswich: “It was John’s first season and he dressed up as a witch and rode on a bike!”
Read more: subedei.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=sgd&thread=4823&page=1#ixzz1MF5mz6r4
« Thread Started Today at 2:21pm »
BY JEFF SCOTT
BOUQUET OF SHALE... another pilgrimage around the tracks of British Speedway
As the tender buds emerge from their long winter sleep, so too do the methanol-fuelled speedway bikes emerge from their workshops in preparation for another season of ear-caressing and nostril-bewitching racing excitement. Also emerging from his writer’s cocoon, albeit less tenderly and with less noise, is Jeff Scott, speedway author and fan ordinaire.
With his keen ear, sympathetic eye, Tupperware container, and match programme, Scott continues to document the sporting phenomena of speedway with all its idiosyncratic passion and players: the brave riders, enduring fans, obsessive collectors, sharp-witted banterers, Super7even beauties, devoted race-night staff and, of course, the ever-optimistic entrepreneurs and managers whose investment ensures the show stays on track at Britain’s temples of shale. Together these supplicants, disciples and participants resist to their utmost the levelling winds of economic and cultural change to celebrate and preserve the sport and community that they love.
As always, Scott prefaces his pilgrimages to the holy places of speedway by publishing another volume in his continuing series of speedway books. This year’s entry is Bouquet of Shale, which joins his other critically acclaimed works and together they constitute a body of work unique in its dedication to a sport as well as the social and cultural scope of its subject.
BOOK DETAILS
Bouquet of Shale
Jeff Scott
Paperback
274 pages
63 black & white photos
175,000 words
£20.00
Methanol Press
ORDER INFORMATION
Available at all good track shops and also can be ordered via payola at www.methanolpress.com or send a £24.50 cheque to cover P&P made payable to "J. Scott" at Methanol Press, 2 Tidy Street, Brighton BN1 4EL
CONFIRMED TOUR DATES (more to follow)
15th May Mildenhall
19th May Ipswich
20th May Scunthorpe
21st May Workington
22nd May Leicester
27th May Somerset
28th May Newport
2nd June Swindon
3rd June Lakeside
17th June Edinburgh
18th June Berwick
19th June Glasgow
25th June Cardiff
11th September Sittingbourne
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1: Lakeside: “We’re clearly not the rubbish team that the experts claimed we were!
Chapter 2: Eastbourne: “He had such a talent and never knew it.”
Chapter 3: Newport: “I’m not telling anyone what to do! I just advise if they want it! Some of them do need it.”
Chapter 4: Rye House: “No one breathes Rye House more than Chris Neath. Cut him in half and he’d be coloured blue and yellow!”
Chapter 5: Sheffield: “When the flag drops the bullshit stops.”
Chapter 6: Mildenhall: “There are excellent sight lines. Every track should be like this!”
Chapter 7: Swindon: “I’d heard he was, then I heard he wasn’t and Davey Watt was and then I heard he was again!”
Chapter 8: Cardiff: “Michael Lee says on his DVD, ‘The people who used to run the sport didn’t want it to get too big!’”
Chapter 9: Redcar: “Chris Mills won’t be on Tomáš Suchánek’s Christmas card list.”
Chapter 10: Edinburgh: “On the track it’s fantastic – off the track we’re losing four figures every week!”
Chapter 11: Northside: “One of the riders here today will go on to be a star! Trouble is, you don’t know which one! In 20 years’ time, we’ll all say that we could see that today.”
Chapter 12: Workington: “He told me that for the first time ever as a referee he had awarded a track 10 out of 10.”
Chapter 13: Newcastle: “If knowing that has annoyed you, remember it when you go out on the track and score a few more points!”
Chapter 14: Isle of Wight: “He said he’d stop the race in case a rider went over the fence and hurt themselves on the brambles!”
Chapter 15: Coventry: “How many other trackshops provide pens for the away fans?”
Chapter 16: Wolverhampton: “When he gates, he wins. If not, he can’t be bothered. He’d be on the list of riders I wouldn’t have in my team!”
Chapter 17: Berwick: “I don’t know if you remember when riders just used to turn up with a second-hand bike on the back of their car with a small toolbox?”
Chapter 18: Buxton: “You go to speedway but you don’t see old riders! They’re not made welcome!”
Chapter 19: Belle Vue: “Am I Chris Morton?”
Chapter 20: Birmingham: “The future is bright – the future is red and yellow.”
Chapter 21: Scunthorpe: “Everyone remembers the Moran brothers – Kelly and Shawn – but all of these lads are going faster than they did then because the bikes have moved on!”
Chapter 22: King’s Lynn: “I try to watch it like a fan.”
Chapter 23: Glasgow: “It’s difficult, there’s so many other bits going on in the world – speedway is getting smaller!”
Chapter 24: Somerset: “If he saw a lake on the way to speedway, he’d stop off and fish!”
Chapter 25: Plymouth: “My missus reckons it’s because it’s got Devils in the name!”
Chapter 26: Plymouth: “They’re doing a job where they could end up in a wheelchair for whatever they’re paid!”
Chapter 27: Sittingbourne: “We’d had 50 races and finished within the curfew.”
Chapter 28: Peterborough: “I don’t like to eat before the show as it gives me indigestion.”
Chapter 29: Dudley: “He doesn’t turn it until - as they used to say - he can read the labels on the beer bottles!”
Chapter 30: Kidlington: “I still send in the occasional piece to the Mail. We haven’t been running for three years so, obviously, it gets more and more difficult!”
Chapter 31: Poole: “He used to ride with both wheels on the safety fence, like it was the wall of death.”
Chapter 32: Ipswich: “It was John’s first season and he dressed up as a witch and rode on a bike!”
Read more: subedei.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=sgd&thread=4823&page=1#ixzz1MF5mz6r4