Peckham Speedway

Interesting email from Only Fools and Horses “Hawk-eye” fan Robert Rogers.
He says “From the latest Rock and Chips film there is a poster in the background of the Cafe seen advertising Peckham Speedway. Well, we know there was never Speedway in Peckham, but there was a Cycle speedway team called the Peckham Stars.
Also on the poster it states, the match is staring Randy Blinkinsop. Well again we know of no rider of that name, so I wonder was this another of Johns Sullivans little `in-jokes`, and who Randy might have been based on?”

We asked Robert, how he managed to dig so deep.
“The reason behind my request is, as a speedway mad kid in the 1960`s following the West Ham Hammers, I am now older and wiser (?), sadly the Hammers are no more, but one of my great interest is the sport in the 60`s.

So as a fan of OFAH, I spotted in the background of the Café what looked like a speedway poster, but as I was watching it `live` I could not catch it as the shot was not on for long and was on the actors, not the café wall!

So you can imaging my interest was fired up. There has only ever been three south London teams, the Wimbledon Dons who’s racing colours were red with a yellow star (as the poster had stars on it a strong possibility), New cross Rangers who wore orange with a Black Maltese cross. Both about in the early 1960`s. Finally Crystal Palace (Glaziers) who raced before WW11, so no much chance of it being them.

There is a very good speedway site called www.speedwayplus.com who are into anything to do with Speedway old and new, and as Speedway fans are renown for their outstanding knowledge on the sport, somebody might know, so I asked if anybody else had noticed it.

Peckham Speedway

Allen who runs the site had also seen the poster and managed to get a screen save (see Attached). There was another shot which showed just the corner of the poster which said staring Randy Blinkinsop.

There never was a rider called Randy Blinksop, and never a Peckham Speedway team, so the questions is,

A) Was John (who will be sadly missed) an old Speedway fan?
B) Was it somebody in Production who was a fan and produced the poster as an `in joke`?

One more clue, there was a Peckham Cycle Speedway team, who were called the STARS (is this the reason for the stars on the poster), or was John a kid riding for them?

See the Link, http://www.cyclespeedwayvets.org.uk/arch_html/arc_sect3/vcsra_arc_sect3.html

There is a photo of the Peckham team, is John in there somewhere?

Thanks very much for your reply, and if there is any story behind it, it might be a nice item for the Speedwayplus site, and next time Rock and Chips is on, there will be a lot of fans looking for the `Speedway Poster`. Plus on cold dark nights, there will no doubt be on a supporters club Quiz night a question, Who did Randy Blinkinsop ride for?

So John has left a legacy of not only Fools and Horses, but of other things.

I expect many fans have their own best favourite bit, but as a Council worker mine has to be Trigger and his Council sweepers broom, who in one programme said to a lady he had the same broom for many years, and it had only had three new handles and four new Brushes….CLASSIC!

Great email Robert – anyone else have a view on what was behind the poster?