In difficult times, Kent Speedway co-promoter, Len Silver has sent out a rallying call to supporters of the Central Park, Sittingbourne based club.

“I’d like to send you all my best wishes for Christmas and the New Year, certainly a strange one for many of us. But the cavalry are coming as the vaccine gives us hope. And the Big Hope for us all is that our Speedway will start at Central Park on Tuesday March 30th as planned, with Easter Monday following right behind. We need to spread this news far and wide.”

And on the team front, Silver goes on: “Team news is pretty good in that all but one of our chosen seven for 2020 will line up for us again. Currently, skipper Scott (Nicholls), team manager Chris (Hunt) and myself are working on the replacement for Nico Covatti and we have all decided that, if we can, to avoid Europeans – with Brexit making life tough for riders from the Continent coming in, that is our route.”

There’s further good news about the Championship division (where the TouchTec-sponsored Kings will start for a first time in 2021)

“All the clubs have confirmed they’ll come to the tapes in 2021. For Chris and myself it will be a learning year at Championship level, getting to know the riders just as we know those at National League level, always aiming to track seven Kings who are competing at the top end of the table, hopefully improving year on year just as we did in the lower league.”

And in these days where reuse and recycling are so important Len has a story to tell of an unexpected Christmas present he’s got for his beloved track.

“In the latter half of last season, my big blade that is used for track prep’, had a break to part of its mechanism that was not able to be repaired. So I had a welding job done to allow me to continue with it.

“But it had lost a lot of adjustment and was far from efficient. I have been considering all kinds of ways to get it to work better without reaching a solution.

“So a few days ago I went onto my computer and Googled “Used Graders” to see if there was something on the market that would do the job. Not being very good at internet stuff, I clicked on this and that without any success….then, I don’t know how, I found a company in the North Midlands showing a picture of a grader blade almost exactly the same as mine, only fully working.

“A much better bet than trying to get my own machine use-able so it did not take long for me to agree its purchase with delivery to Central Park in a few days time. Imagine my surprise to discover that the blade had been in daily use at Stoke’s Loomer Road track until its recent closure.

“No wonder it was exactly what I was looking for! A Christmas present to myself and the track”