Somewhere over the rainbow…

First of all, a service announcement … “Mick, click here for the all singing, all colour version of the Blunsdon Blog.”

The weather forecast was awful but the day started well with beautiful clear blue skies. The rain arrived later before the sun re-appeared and a glorious rainbow lit up the sky. Did the end of the rainbow lie somewhere near to the site for the proposed new stadium? Was it a portent of things to come?

Work continued on the safety fence this week and featured another of the backroom boys whose work is often overlooked but whose contributions are invaluable.

Mick, from Swindon Pressure Cleaning Ltd, is the man who blasts away the dirt from the air fences each week. During the season Mick is always at the track first thing on a Thursday (race day) morning, to pressure wash the air bags and the advertising hoardings. Mick is a great speedway fan and has a wealth of stories and anecdotes about speedway at Blunsdon. When the air fence was first introduced at Blunsdon it seems that it was cleaned with buckets of water and brushes – a daunting task. Mick has been cleaning the fence for the past two years and does a marvellous job.

Our major task for the day is to clean as many of the fence panels from turns three and four before the rain comes. The entire air fence has to be sent back to the manufacturers for a service over the close season and they have a history of rejecting air fences that have not been cleaned properly. We link up the air fence panels in the car park and Mick begins the task of clearing the shale and slime. As if the mud on the outside of the panels was not bad enough, much of it has found its way inside the panels and has clogged up the Velcro fastenings.

Gerald, Punch and Mick continue with the cleaning while I drill out the rivets from the remaining kick boards. We are still having to rely upon our own tools after last week’s break in. There is little chance of us being able to get the stolen tools back so until replacements have been found we have to rely upon our own personal kit.

The sun stays out and helps to dry the cleaned panels. Out on the track Gerald has begun the massive task of blading some of the shale back from the kick boards. The result is a slushy surface and there is little we can do until the sun begins to dry some of it out.

Mick finishes the panels and then passes the pressure washer over our cars. I can’t remember seeing my white Peugeot looking so smart.

By the afternoon the surface of the track has been sufficiently dried to allow us to venture out with big motorway blade. Punch and Gerald are of the opinion that the surface is perfect for blading. The dampness in the surface has made its way down to the sub layers and the shale should cut evenly and easily. If the track is too dry the blade skims the surface but makes little real impact. The one drawback with our present planning is that the storm clouds are massing and its clear that rain on the bladed material will turn the whole surface into a morass.

Gerald starts work on the back straight entering turn three and the blade cuts down two or three inches. He pushes the material into turn three and returns to cut more away to even the back straight. As the season progresses more and more shale is graded away from the corners and down onto the main straights. This is unavoidable and happens mostly during grading mid meeting when the surface on the corners is cut as the back tyres struggle to grip. The excess is then collected by the graders and gradually builds up on the straights.

Punch follows Gerald with a tractor to distribute the shale more evenly and also to begin to pack down the loose material. Everything is going smoothly and then the rain starts to fall. The temperature drops dramatically and the whole scene becomes dark and gloomy. We work on for as long as we can but are soon soaked to the skin. By the time that we get the blade and the tractor off the track the surface is riven with rivulets from the dog track.

It seems that we will continue working each week up until Christmas. Plans are afoot to finish the fence panels and get them shipped off to AirTeck and a small digger is ordered so that we can dig a trench across turn one to carry a drainage pipe from the dog track to the main drain on the in field. Hopefully this will end the problems that we have suffered on turn 1.

Talk turns to the plans for the new stadium. At this stage it appears that speedway is to be included after the remarkable support campaign at the tale end of last season when the whole future of the sport in the Swindon area was thrown into doubt. Certainly the track will be smaller than the present one. The consensus amongst the three of us is that we’d like a track similar to Somerset’s but with slightly longer straights. One thing that we are in complete agreement upon is the need to build in drainage right from the start. Too many tracks have been constructed in the middle of stadia with no consideration as to how to get excess water away from the surface and out of the stadium. We must make sure that an efficient drainage system is put in place between greyhound and speedway tracks.

By the time that we are finished putting away all of the machinery the sun has come out and a beautiful rainbow has appeared. Gerald breaks into song – he claims its from the Wizard of Oz. Punch and I are unconvinced. We contemplate telling him to stick to track preparation and to forget about a career in musicals, but he’s happy with what’s been done so we leave him to his howlings!