Southmead Pride Cycle Speed Club

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Cycle Speedway started in the Southmead area in the late 40's on a piece of wasteland behind Lanercost Rd. They later moved to a cinder track not far from where the Treble chance stands today.

Calling themselves the Southmead Bulldogs they competed against other local teams from the Bristol Area. I was told that this carried on into the 50's.

In 1978 the sport was revived by a local lad from the Southmead area (Chris Headley) who approached a team of youngsters from the old estate and arranged for us to race in the Bristol League, using the old bowling green in Doncaster Road Park.

With Mike Holloway coming on board as team manager and coach, the team being Tim Haynes, Chris Headley, Paul Holloway, Shaun Needs, Steven Attwill, and Dean Hurst, we soon found out that this was a sport of skill combined with speed. Losing our meetings convincingly that season, we finished bottom of the Bristol C.S.C. League Two.

This did not deter us and during the winter of 78-79, we practiced two sometimes three times a week to improve our track and bike handling skills. By April of 79 when the new season started, we were stronger, fitter, wiser and raring to go, still using the bowling green as a track. This time we finished top of the league and not losing a match all season, some riders not losing a race.

This encouraged more youngsters to join us and during the 80's we became a stronger club and with the council building us a proper track, we were able to field four teams, all youngsters from the Southmead area, the teams being Southmead, Charton Mead, North Bristol, and Greenway. Southmead competed in not only the Bristol League but the Southwest League as well, against teams from Pool, Bournemouth, Weymouth Southampton, Exeter Swindon, and Newport, with some riders representing Bristol in the British National League.

All this came to an end in 1990 with the collapse of the Bristol League and Cycle Speedway finished in Southmead until now.

In 2006 it is back with the help of a new track being built at Filton (Elm Park). I (Paul Holloway) was contacted by Andy Hewitt of Filton and was asked if I could restart the Southmead Team, but use the Filton Track. This I agreed to and quickly with the help of my son, Ryan, started to coach some youngsters on the old Southmead track at Doncaster Road. With the track being overgrown it was decided to ask our old friends from East newport who invited us over to use there track and bikes.

On the 10th of June, we entered 7 lads into an under 14 national individual at Oxford with one lad finishing fourth and another sixth. With the other five putting in a very respectable performance, this was a great result for the Southmead Team and accollades coming from all corners of the track, the boys' journey home was a very loud one!

June 24th and another visit to Wales, our first team match at East Newport and we won 73 - 76, with a team of seven, six boys and one girl, they all put in a great performance. What a result: 4 - 1st Place; 3 - 2nd Place; 2 - 3rd Place; and 1 - 4th Place.

WHERE WE ARE TODAY:
We began working with the council to see if we can get the Southmead Track ready for next season. We tried to do this ourselves but has proven too much with only a couple of shovels. We could do with some help with this and in March 07, help arrived with Collum and his gang! Starting at 10.30AM on a Sunday morning, the digger was off-loaded and 2 hours later a track appeared! A BIG THANK YOU to CR Contractors for their valued help.

Be sure to check out our gallery for pictures of the club. We even managed to scare up a couple from 1978 and 1984 teams!