Cycle Speedway

Cycle Speedway Test Match Great Britain v Australia Thursday 6 August 2015 Women's 5.00pm, main event 7.15pm Hearsall Common To be televised by Sky Sports

Many thanks for this MR. Forget Sky, it's a great live sport and it's free! Unfortunately I won't be able to due to another commitment . I'd also got tickets for the cricket at Edgbaston yesterday

These are great events at the racetrack on Hearsall Common and attract large crowds and a large bank of covered seating was brought in for the previous two events for those wishing to be seated. Also worth noting that parking is FREE (assuming they don't decide this time to charge for it!) across the road on the fairground site. It also appears that the television coverage will not be "live" (can't see anything in the Sky planner) so that shouldn't reduce the attendance on the day

There used to be a cycle speedway track at the Green Hill in Wyken in the sixties, we spent the majority of our school holidays there, still got the scars, great days.

I remember well the Alvis Aces on the corner of Holyhead road and Four Pounds ave. Where I live now in West Yorkshire we have a local cycle speedway team, and outfit that meet at the cycle track in Heckmondwike, meet Sunday afternoons and they have a good following.

COVENTRY Cycle Speedway are staging a major event on Thursday August 6 and all speedway fans are welcome. The meeting is the Third Test between Great Britain and Australia with the best-of-three series currently standing at 1-1. A crowd of over 1,000 is expected with admission free and all facilities are in place including grandstand, food, LED screen and programmes. The venue is Hearsall Common, with the club hoping to build a new track in Coventry complete with facilities. Coventry Speedway promoter Mick Horton will be in attendance along with several other invited guests including the Leader of the Council and the Lord Mayor. Start-time is 7.15pm.

Regarding the Cycle track on the Red Hills, if you judged one of the corners wrong You would finish up in the Sowe a the bottom of the steep side of the hill. Not been down there for over 40 years the trees would have had a new life we were always chopping bushes down for the 5th November bonfire. Our house in the Croft is long gone plus lots more around the area and where we played, with the exception of the Red Hills and Meeting field have been built on.

Sadly I can't make it tonight but I've heard more than once that the event is being broadcast live on TV. I can't seem to find it anywhere in the schedules, has anyone got any idea what channel it's on?

I think it will be shown in October, Sky filmed it. Maybe someone will put something on youtube before then?

I rode my cow-horned handle-barred bike for the Folly Lane Flyers in the Coventry Cycle Speedway League... memories of this,anyone? Edited by Midland Red, 17th Aug 2015 4:41 pm (This sentence copied from the o p's original posting on a separate subject/thread)

I remember a team called 'The Craven Cats' but where they stood in the overall scheme of things escapes me, perhaps something to do with a pub 'The Craven Arms' on the Binley road???

COVENTRY captain Chris Harris will be presenting awards on the second day of this weekend's British Indoor Cycle Speedway Championships. The event takes place at the Coventry Sports Connexion on January 2-3 with a total of eight separate British Indoor Final titles to be decided at individual, team, senior and junior levels. The Coventry Cycle Speedway club are staging the event for the first time as promoters. Amongst the competitors are regular speedway second-halver Kyle Roberts, who is also part of the Chris Harris Racing Team, and he starts in the British Junior Championship qualifying stages on Saturday at 10am. Events on that day also include the British Individual Final at 4pm. Harris will be attending on Sunday to present the awards for the British Open Team Final, with the event starting at 5.30pm. Admission on both days is free but the club are asking for spectators to buy a programme, priced at £2.50, as a gesture to their volunteering efforts and to help with the high costs to stage the finals. These efforts include bringing in a speedway air-fence!

In the mid 60's the Coventry and District Cycle Speedway League consisted of the following teams: Brandon Bees (track in the Speedway car park); Keresley Cobras (track near to the Wallace Pub); Blackhorse Champs (track in Blackhorse Rd, Exhall) Bedworth Champs (the Blackhorse team at a new track in Heckley Fields, Exhall); Earlsdon Hammers (track at Spencer Park, Earlsdon) Whoberley Witches (track at Hearsall Common - the current one now much changed); Henley Hunters (track at Purcell Rd, Bell Green behind the flats and overlooking Henley College) Morris Motors (track at Stoke Heath Park, just behind the Barras Hotel); Longford Lions (track by the canal in Longford. Was it Grange Rd?); Whitley Rangers (track in the park at London Rd, Whitley); Attleborough Saints (track in Attleborough, Nuneaton by a community centre); Long Lawford Lions (track in Long Lawford, Rugby); Warwick Blue Diamonds (track in Linen Street, Warwick, next to the racecourse - now a lake!). Earlsdon and Whoberley merged to become Coventry Cycle Speedway Club with big ambitions to race in national leagues. The Coventry league staged 'test matches' with leagues from all over the UK which were generally timed to take place when the proper speedway team was at Brandon so the Edinburgh test match would be staged on the Sunday following the visit of Edinburgh Monarchs to Brandon on the Saturday night and the return test match would be staged in Edinburgh to coincide with the Bees fixture. Happy days. Anyone else involved in the years 1964 to 1968?

We used to go to a track with our made up bikes with no brakes at the Greenhills in Wyken, close to Caludon Castle school, would spend most of the school holidays there, I think the older lads were in a league. Great days, we would be out till it was dark and go home tired and hungry.