The battle against the weather becomes ever more serious as the weeks pass by and the start of the new 2010 season looms over us. I think we could have legitimately have expected at least a little dry weather by the end of January, but no. While we were able to work outside and relatively dry on 28th January, the wet stuff had done its damage on the preceding days.
The need to finish the boarding job on turn 3 was now of prime importance - unless we could board we would be faced with a massive influx of sand into the shale with disastrous consequences.
So large is this re-boarding job that we are beginning to run out of old kickboards to re-use and are now having to cut the big boards into two pieces.
It's a little like a production line at times. Roy cuts the boards, Ron paints, Mick and Mark bring them out and Rex and I dig the trench and lower them into place.
Each board is leveled, although this is more difficult than it seems since nothing at the Abbey seems to be level, and then back filled with shale and thoroughly tamped down. With Rex and Mark able to come along we are able to spread out the jobs so Punch and Arron are elsewhere on site clearing ground and tidying up equipment while Ron spends spare moments in number 96 preparing our latest culinary feast - Lincolnshire Sausages with mustard mash served with "lashings" of home made red onion gravy.
When you're wet and cold and the job seems to have no end, the occasional waft of good cooking as we pass by our little staff room / bistro is enough to lift spirits.
We are still able to use the dumper on hire from Andy Nurden. In one section of turn 3 we are able to shift three dumper loads of sand and shale that have accumulated behind the safety fence and boards during the last two years. Hopefully, by pulling out all of this waste material there will be much less pressure upon the boards while allowing excess water to run more evenly from the greyhound track, thus avoiding the little rivulets that would form and then cut their way through the shale's surface.
Inspecting work done previously shows that while water can run away, sand deposits are left behind. If we can keep on top of this then we can go a long way towards removing the bane of all Swindon track curators' lives - contaminated shale.
With our stomachs filled with the delicious offerings and a chance to chat with Swindon co-owner, Terry Russell, who joins us for lunch, we return to our labours until a sharp squall of rain drives us back to number 96 and brings the day to a rather sudden ending.
Once again we find ourselves frustrated because the weather has beaten us and the "To Do, Ron, Ron" list is still far from completed.
February and just over a month to go before the bikes return to the Abbey Stadium. It's been another week with heavy rain and a lack of any sunshine and the track is suffering. The deep frosts and snow have done significant damage to the shale which is now sticking to our boots in great slimy clumps. The frost has penetrated deep into the sub base and broken it up. The effect is a little like delaminating - whole layers of shale break away.
Sadly, the shale is not the only thing that is delaminating. The boarding that we were given last year, and which we so lovingly primed, undercoated and then glossed, is delaminating. We suspected this would be the case at the time and that buying cheaply often simply meant "buying expensively" and sadly we have been proved right.
The boards, only in place on the back straight for less than a year, are not in good condition. We decide to remove them, replacing them with new boards, so that they can be dried out in the changing rooms, that now double up as a paint shop, before being repainted and sealed again.
The build up of sand and shale at the end o f the back straight is severe and the difference in levels between speedway and greyhound tracks is also clear. At the entrance to turn 3 the greyhound track is 18 inches or more higher than the speedway track on the other side of the safety fence - and guess where the run off goes!
But we make good progress in digging out masses of contaminated material and the new boards go in well.
Meantime, Punch, we just loves anything mechanical, has spied a small digger on loan from Andy Nurden. Although it is supposed to be collected later in the day a pleading telephone calls secures it for another 24 hours and Punch has plans.
The riders' car park at the back of the pits is quite a large area but vans seem to get larger each year and the crush for space is a concern. The banking on one side takes up quite a bit of space so Punch sets to with digger to cut back said banking, and use Arron and the dumper as a means of removing the excess to fill up some holes in the car park, affectionately known as the "graveyard" behind the stadium. For those new to the Blog, the "graveyard" is just that. Three years ago a team of archeologists arrived on site and starting digging up parts of the complex looking for ancient burial grounds. They dug trenches on the centre green but found nothing other than clay and rock. But at the back of the stadium they identified remains that led them to conclude that it was a significant burial site.
Wooden fences went up, teams of pony tailed diggers arrived and after two weeks hard work they found ... one body. No, not an ex member of the tack staff nor an ex promoter - simply a set of very old bones.
Disappointed that massive Saxon treasure was not lurking at the surface, the site was roughly bulldozed over and locked up. When, subsequently, the gates were unlocked the stadium used the ground as a spare car park, hence its name.
But the surface has always been very uneven so any extra material, such as that dug away by Punch, can always been used to fill in imperfections elsewhere.
But our work on the back straight boarding is brought to an untimely halt late morning. With only 12 of the 36 boards in place we have to bring a halt to proceedings. The shale is breaking up so badly that we can't get the dumper out onto the track and even walking on it is doing damage.
What we need is three or four days without rain and preferably with a bit of sun or at least a drying wind, just to get some of the moisture out so that the blade can go out and pack down the shale and even it out.
Where we are working is just about the place where a speeding speedway rider will throw the bike almost sideways, wind on the gas and begin the broadslide that will take him round the corner. The pressure on the surface at this point is immense and so, of all areas of the track, this needs to be perfectly packed.
We trudge back to the confines of number 96 to savour a Morroccan tagine recipe that Ron has acquired.
Punch and I carry on with the car park project, him in the JCB, me in the digger, while Arron is kept on his toes as I swing the bucket of the digger wildly in the direction of the dumper that he's driving.
