Why did Britain fall out of love with speedway?

It’s classified by the government as an ‘elite’ sport but you’ll struggle to find it mentioned in the national press. The current European champion is a Briton — Robert Lambert — but I’d be surprised if many people reading this have ever heard of him. It was once reckoned to be Britain’s second most popular spectator sport but the weekly numbers attending this summer’s shortened league season will be in the low tens of thousands.

I’m talking about speedway, which has dropped out of national consciousness so much that it’s often necessary to explain what it actually is: motorbikes, four riders, racing four laps around an oval circuit at up to 70mph and, crucially, without any brakes. Catch it on a good day and it’s one of the most exciting sports there is. Each race — which lasts around a minute — is a roaring mix of noise, shale and mud.