"What a night!,....the 51st Annual Dinner Dance of the WSRA (World Speedway Riders' Association,) in our new venue of the Leicester Marriott Hotel was voted a great success by one and all. A full house of 350 guests packed into the dining room for some good food, good company, good jokes ( and corny ones too!) and good bagpipe playing  from Lee-Ann Clarkson of the Brechin Pipe Band in Scotland. . Thanks too to my friend from schoolboy and Glasgow Cycle Speedway days, Norman Christie for his welcome speech, he is a hard act to follow and should really have been on the stage instead of our WSRA Dinner.

It certainly is a great honour to be voted in as President of this great Association, taking over from Ivan Mauger and when I looked down the list of famous past presidents, I was the only one I hadn't heard of!  It is the ex-rider's equivalent of becoming World Champion.. As 2007, President, Ivan represented the WSRA in Australia and New Zealand and I replaced him at many of the Association's events here in the  UK , I think I must qualify as they only guy in Speedway to have been a Tactical Substitute for Ivan Mauger!

Each year, our Honourary Chaplain, The Reverend Michael Whawell, has the unfortunate job of having to read out the names of the members who had
passed on to that pits area in the sky during the year, and a long list it was this year and we paused to remember them. Reverend Michael is slightly different from your normal "Man of The Cloth", as most Vicars have their Parish bicycle or Morris Minor car with stained glass windows, Michael  must be the only Minister in the UK to own  a 500cc Weslake Speedway bike! He even fires it up from time to time just to give his neighbours a  whiff of Castrol 'R' with their afternoon tea. No wonder we call him our "Revvin' Reverend"!.

The new venue attracted favourable comments from everyone and with four World Champions present, Barry Briggs, Ivan Mauger, Freddie Williams and Mark Loram, joining guests from Czech Republic, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa,  Alex Hughson from California, Germany, Tenerife, Holland, Sweden (Bengt Jansson), Denmark,(Jan Staechmann),  Norway, (Sverre Harrfeldt and Odd Fossengen)  and "The  Swally Tours" from Scotland, this was a truly International event.

It was good so see my friends at Speedway Star booking a table for the first time, even although they have heard all my corny jokes previously on our Grand Prix trips,  but they were out in force. Travel Plus, who do such a good job with their Speedway Star Tours even had two tables. TP boss, James Easter runs some excellent Speedway and Ice Racing tours with breakfast in Heathrow,lunch in Prague and luggage in Honolulu.

Unfortunately, this year we had to run without a Guest of Honour.  British Champion, Chris Harris was due to be our honoured guest but cancelled owing to having to attend a team practice in Poland over the weekend. Being too late to ask someone to replace Chris, as they would have been thought of as second choice, we went ahead with a gap in the programme/menu. Actually, I believe that when Chris heard that I was going to speak and also that we were having bagipes at the dinner, he thought it would be safer going to Poland, It's great to see some of the younger riders such as Troy Pratt, Joe Screen, Mark Loram, Shane Parker, etc joining our Association and help swell the membership numbers.   As you know, the Association was formed back in 1957 by journalist, Peter Arnold as "The Veteran DIRT TRACK Riders' Association", but was later changed to the "Veteran SPEEDWAY Riders' Association". Now we have changed again to the "WORLD Speedway Riders' Association" in the hope of attracting some of the younger riders, and the name change has certainly worked. The WSRA is going from strength to strength but we always need new members to come along and join us and keep the momentum going.

Three of our wheelchair boys, Graham Miles, Joe Owen and Garry Stead all came along to support us and it is great that despite the cruel blows that Speedway dealt them, they are still keen on the sport and supporting the WSRA. Thanks, lads.

The new venue of The Leicester Marriott got the thumbs up from everyone with good food, good service and comfortable rooms, so this could be the beginning of a long association.

With celebrations going on long into the night and into the morning, we should probably rename our annual dinner, "WSRA  Saturday Night and Sunday Morning"

Visit www.Mike-Patrick.com to view or purchase photos

taken at the Dinner Dance

We thank Mike for allowing us to publish these images.

 
 

On the right Outgoing President Ivan Mauger hands the chain of office to our new president Bert Harkins


 
Additional Photos supplied by Terry Stone on next page click here