Gardening and messing about at the start line..

[moranboys]

yes.start marshall to give rider one warning then back 15m if not heeded.

[bosssuggs]

Sept 21, 2016 6:10:20 GMT fetslickgater said:

I disagree with gardening and time wasting.

With all the time curfews I believe it would be good to set the 2 minutes as soon as the last rider from the previous heat leaves the track (will all referees deal with this in the same way) and any rider not at the tapes and ready when time expires on the two minutes would be sent back to the pits, not sure how many riders would be digging themselves in at the start if this were the rule, gardening is a more recent creation, back in the day, riders just got on with it, or we could have concrete start areas as they do in cycle speedway which can be designed to give the grid positions the necessary grip, and time saver and surely better for the riders with all the potholes on the start line how long before someone takes a nasty tumble as the race continues.

I agree not to give the starting marshalls any powers, the referee has a good view of everything going on and should act responsibly.

GET RID OF gardening and timewasting, after all we pay to be ENTERTAINED, most clubs are struggling with smaller fanbases, time to give US the fans a sport we can be proud of.

Really? "Start the 2 minutes as soon as they leave the track from the previous race??"
So your 'night out at the speedway' becomes 45 minutes out? 7:30pm start and back in your car by 8:30pm?? Honestly you think THAT will ATTRACT people?? 😂😂😂😂

[bosssuggs]

Sept 19, 2016 22:33:11 GMT andout said:

Sept 19, 2016 22:01:16 GMT bosssuggs said:

Gardening is and always will be essential. Giving some Start Marshalls too much influence would be dangerous as they generally support the home side and could cause a lot of trouble.
I recall the Marshall at Ipswich once grabbing Billy Hamill's mudguard to slow him away from the gate resulting in a mass brawl before the referee booted the Marshall out! The one at Stoke has been involved in several "heated exchanges" too always with visiting riders. And I also recall an unsavoury incident with Buxton's Marshall when he pushed Ash Morris!!

Really? "Gardening is and always will be essential.".....Please give the reason.....never was this way in the past, never is this way in several countries....
Though I do agree with the other elements of your post.

Gardening IS essential because it is often vital to get some dirt back into the grooves on the starting gate (a) for traction but also (b) because very often there is a real chance of 'bottoming out' in the groove and being left with a spinning rear wheel as the engine casing sits on the lips of the groove not only is that detrimental to your start but could be incredibly dangerous if you think it's 'bottomed out'then the spinning wheel grips and you take off out of control.

[sparkesfrankie666]

Bit late but I'll add my 2p to the conversation.

TL;DR: the powers the referee already has to deal with riders delaying the start are enough; they just need enforcing. The start marshal(s) should not be involved in this since they lack the requirements for impartiality required from a referee. Gardening is an issue, but there are other, bigger problems surrounding the start procedure.

The problem with gardening at the start is that a referee won't want to exclude a rider because that often entails more delays to a meeting than simply waiting for the rider to come to tapes. Even if the rulebook ordered a 15m handicap, it still takes time for the start marshal to mark a white line 15m back and to reorder the riders as required by the handicap.

If there is one thing in the rulebook I would revert, it's the change the SCB made to the 2 minutes in 2016 that allowed a rider to "proceed without stopping to the starting gate" after expiry instead of the previous "at the start and ready to race". Personally, I don't understand why this change was necessary; if it was to deal with the fact different tracks place the pit gates in different parts of the track, riders should be aware of both how long it takes to get to the line and how much time they have remaining. They shouldn't need to be allowed to slowly proceed to the start line after the 2 minutes has expired.

This leads on to the idea of having a clock on the start line or in the pits. This was a requirement for televised meetings to have one at the start line until they removed it in 2019, it is a requirement to use it if the stadium has one, and should become a requirement for stadiums to have one to use.

Going on to what the referee can already do, I'm looking at Art. 011.5 of the 2020 rulebook. There are six starting offences listed, of which 4 are punishable with immediate exclusion and two by warning followed by exclusion. Two are pertinent to this discussion and one is more of a generic catch-all:
- "gate preparation after the expiry of the 2 minute allowance" (b, exclusion).
- "not obeying the Start Marshal's instructions." (c, warning).
- "delaying the start in any other manner, or who prevents the starting gate from being released properly." (f, warning).
From this we see the referee already has the capacity to exclude a rider who continues to garden after the two minutes and to warn a rider if they fail to obey the calls from the start marshal to come to tapes. This isn't a case of this being allowed; rather, it's the case that the referees fail to enforce the existing rules, likely due to them further delaying the meeting and causing outrage across social media similar to that time in 2014 when two Swindon riders were thrown out at Coventry for the same reason: gardening after expiry.

I don't believe that a start marshal should get involved due to concerns over impartiality. Other people have mentioned this and I echo their concerns.

It's worth noting that for 2021 the FIM have brought in the option of a 1 minute time allowance for "a restart after an unsatisfactory start" at the discretion of the race director. While I think this'll be interesting to see tested – but believe that it'll catch at least one rider out, likely a wild card, at some point – this won't address the main issue I have with the flow of FIM meetings, especially in 2020. For my mind at FIM level, the issue is not riders gardening but referees taking an eternity to work out what rider moved at the start enough to force them to call it back. If the referee saw a rider move enough for them to call it back, the referee should in most cases be capable enough to issue a warning without delay and put the riders straight back on 2 minutes. SCB referees in the UK can do it, why can't FIM referees?