A bright and extremely breezy start to the day at Swindon this week as we prepared for the clash against the Ipswich Witches, the team that the Robins had so spectacularly overturned in the televised Sky meeting from Foxhall earlier in the week.

The weather forecasters had, for once, got it exactly right - bright sunshine but a keen easterly wind blowing in cold air from Central Europe. And by God, it was cold.

A combination of bright sunshine and a "keen" wind dries out a track faster than anything I know and so it was important that we got as much water into the track as possible. We could have used our normal spray but in the prevailing conditions 90% of the water would have been blown away and the rest would have dried up before it had penetrated down into the base.

Gerald and Punch attached the watering bar to the back of our tanker and gave the track a real soaking. The bar pushes a significant amount of water straight down onto the surface.

It doesn't look pretty, and of course we do have the added problem of the steep banking - here the water still runs straight down the white line and it's so difficult to get it into the surface.

The experiment with removing all of the banners at the end of each meeting and cleaning them away from the track is working well. Mick Richards, who pressure cleans the panels, can now clean the air fence so much quicker and there is less excess water that spreads rather unevenly onto the track.

The sun disappears as clouds drift over, heavy leaden clouds that give us a swift snow shower. Global warming!! The spirit of Siberia is with us again. We retreat into the cosy comfort that is number 96 and bring life back to frozen fingers with a cup of coffee.

Punch and I set about putting a new tow bar on the back of the trusty Robin, our "new" Land Rover. We want to use it to pull the trailer that we modified over the winter. In this way we will be able to move all of the banners, air pumps, air bags and all manner of paraphernalia about without having to return to the pits.

As it is, the new modifications are put to the test straight away - Roy and I find we have to replace an air bag on turn 2. This is part of a section that has already caused me some concern - the ministrations of Mr Suchecki from Poole and a heavy build up of shale have meant that the panel has not been sitting well. When a tractor clips it, it sags even more. A tear has appeared in the fabric close to where the panel is clipped to the safety fence. The tear crosses an area of stitching. After a brief contemplation I decide that a repair cannot be made in situ and that the whole thing has to come out.

As I have mentioned before, I have a nightmare scenario. A televised match at Swindon is already running behind schedule - several re-starts and the odd bit of controversy mean that the director has a limited amount of time to fit heats 14 and 15 into the time allocated by Sky. The match is on a knife edge - as Jonathan would say "It could go either way" - and then someone clatters into the air fence and a panel is punctured.

"Patch it over and get the re-run," screams the director. "It must be replaced," agree the Clerk of the Course and the referee. All hell breaks loose. The pressure is on.

An air panel must be replaced before the meeting can continue. The Sky director is now running across the infield, headphones in one hand, large sharp pointed object in the other. He doesn't look as if he's keen on a chat about the weather.

So what happens when a bag has to be changed. Sounds simple really - take the old one out and plug the new one in. But it's not that easy. For a start it's very dark and you are probably up to your elbows in wet, cloying, heavy shale. One person must be dispatched to turn down the air pumps a little, to relieve the pressure on the air bags on either side. The pins must be taken out from the clasps that hold the top of the bag firmly to the safety fence and then the clasps that hold the panels together must be undone. Each panel is also clipped to the bottom of the safety fence, and it is these clips that potentially present the nightmare scenario. When inflated the bags try to pull themselves straight but, since they are on a curve, they pull out against the safety fence. The clips are under significant pressure. They have also probably been buried under shale that has fallen behind the bags during the season. This shale is wet and so the clips rust, and will not open.

Assuming the clips are undone, the next task is to remove the air pipes that conduct the air from one bag to the next. Removing a bag means disconnecting 4 air pipes. As soon as they are disconnected 4 bungs must be inserted in the bags on either side to prevent even more air loss and the possible deflation of the entire air fence. The old bag (not the cleverest choice of words there, but they'll have to do) can now be removed to the centre field.

The new bag is dragged out, clipped at the bottom and then the bungs are removed and the air pipes re-connected. The clasps on the back of the panel are attached to the adjoining air bags and then the clips at the top of the panel are attached to the safety fence. The banners are replaced and the air pumps turned back up to maximum revs to get as much air back into the air fence as possible.

Job done. But in the nightmare it is cold and wet - headless chickens are running around and the Sky director has made it clear he has murderous tendencies.

And we've got a Sky meeting coming up soon. In an attempt to speed up the process I've been replacing the old clips at the bottom of the fences with, yes, you've guessed it, cable ties. No more scrabbling around in the mud, just a simple snip with a pair of wire cutters.

As Roy and I disconnect the punctured air bag I heave the connecting pipes out and ask Roy to disconnect the rest of the fence. "Done it already," he cries, a smirk on his face. And so he has. This is one of the panels with the cable ties already in place, and it comes out just like a dream.

Smugly satisfied, we make our way back to the pits to find that important personages have arrived.

Last year we had a track inspection from Speedway Control Board track inspector Colin Meredith, but this is no ordinary inspection. We are in the presence of greatness. Our inspection team consist of Tony Noel from the ACU and Christer Bergstrom, the official FIM Track Inspector.

Christer is here to inspect the Abbey Stadium to see whether it could be used for official FIM speedway meetings in the future. Tall and affable, he takes his measuring stick (I'm sure there's a name for them but I can't recall it) and walks the track with Gerald. He measures around the white line and then adds 5 metres, explaining that a track circumference is assessed 1 metre out from the white line, but measuring a track of our size and adding 5 metres is accurate enough. It's a relief when he informs us that it's till the same size that it was last time it was measured. He also inspects the air fence, the safety fence, the starting gate, the width of the straight and pretty much everything.

Back at Number 96 he and Tony explain what they are doing and we chat about speedway in general. Christer comments that most new tracks in Europe are built to FIM standards but British tracks tend to be older and more restricted (in that they have to share facilities with other sports and so find it more difficult to meet the exacting standards of the FIM.

Gerald asks me to show Christer and Tony the referee's box and any other facilities that they wish to inspect. This gives me a chance to chat with Christer about the state of speedway worldwide and especially of speedway in Sweden. The sport is on the up around Europe although he's not so sure about Britain (at this stage I hope that he didn't see the televised match from Ipswich where the riders appeared to outnumber the spectators in a stadium that looked very sad. I did enquire about the ACU and the FIM's view on tractors parked on the infield during a meeting, as they were at Ipswich. This is a complete "No, No!" as far as both are concerned.

Swedish tracks still don't use air fences for general meetings, although Christer thinks this will come about soon. The catch style netting that they use is very safe, slowing the rider and preventing rider and equipment from bouncing back into the path of following riders. He knows the Swedish tracks that I visited last year very well - Vetlanda, Gislaved and Linkoping - and is sad that the sport seems to be being pushed out at Linkoping in favour of motor cross and trials riding facilities.

Tony is unable to stay for the evening meeting but Christer is looking forward to watching the match in the company of Peter Toogood who is apparently on his way to meet with him. It's been a real pleasure talking with Christer, whose father was instrumental in the development of the fledgling sport in Sweden and Denmark. I leave him to fill out his report on The Abbey and return to the pits.

The afternoon work is split between regular light watering of the track and the removal of the kickboards on the damaged fence panel. The rip is almost impossible to repair so Gerald and I decide that it must go back to Air Tek for re-stitching. For this to happen it must be cleaned and the rubber kick board removed.

When this is complete Roy, Adam and I take Robin and his trailer out onto the track and begin the task of putting all the banners up in place. 42 air panels mean we have to put up 42 banners, trying to put new ones in conspicuous places and trying to avoid duplication of banners on the same corner. In calm conditions this isn't easy - in a gale, as we have now, it is nigh impossible. The prospect of Roy, last seen floating over the trees, Mary Poppins style, is is a distinct possibility.

We get the last of the banners in place, only to find that a new set have arrived, a couple of which are double length (10 metres). When we are asked to check that the right banners are up (and which ones are the right banners) at 6pm the air turns blue and hostile.

Anyway, we get it all done, and the track looks OK and the racing is interesting. The Robins snatch a 45 all draw at the end of the night and the track holds up well. Nobody actually visits the air fence although both home reserves make very close inspections of the panels on turn 4 on a number of occasions.

At the end we put our new working pattern into practice. With all track staff working like dervishes for the first 15 minutes after the end of post match practice we have the air fence down, the banners off and folded on the centre green, the kickboards cleared of excess shale and everything looking fair and dandy.

A small band, made up largely of the turns 1 and 2 crew, stay on longer to help collect the air pumps and all the other paraphernalia. In the photo above are just some of them, demonstrating clearly that there is one team who ride the track and another, equally important team, who provide them with a track to ride.

As we slump down in number 96 at the end of the match we find it difficult to appreciate that we have completed all of the post match work in just over an hour. The track is completely re-graded and thoroughly packed down and ready for next week. For me it's a relatively short drive home (18 miles or so). For Gerald it's now a monster 120 mile drive to Lakeside so that he's up and ready to start work on the Purfleet track at 7am in readiness for their Friday night match against Peterborough. Rather him that me!

But we've not finished for the week. With the visitation from Sky comes the expectation that the old place should look as good as possible, and that means a Saturday morning painting and "tarting" session.

Punch and Keith are already hard at work cleaning the boards and the white line when I pitch up at 8.30. Soon after I am joined by Mark Prince and Paul Gibbs, the latter arriving on the most stunning Ducati decked out in the colours of the American AMA racer Ben Bostrom. Mike Hunt appears soon after and then we are joined by Richard, our sole volunteer from a request placed on the Robins web site seeking volunteer help. "I thought there'd be a real crowd here this morning," he chirps. When I respond that this turn out represents a crowd in normal circumstances he gets the point.

While the others apply copious quantities of the red and white stuff to the kickboads I take the opportunity of deflated air panels to remove all the old and rusted clips (see above left) with cable ties The nylon ties should be strong enough to keep the panels in close to the bottom of the wire fence yet easy enough to snip when a panel needs changing.

Mark and Paul start on the white line, all 360 metres of it. Without the flamboyancy of the Da Vinci boys, they still demonstrate great technique, but need more practice if they are to emulate Mr Hunt, whose use of the long handled roller is almost poetic. "It's all in the wrist you see," he proclaims. We nod and hope that he is referring to the painting and not to anything else.

Three hours later and the work is done, just in time for Gerald to arrive back from Lakeside having battled with the M25 and the M4 all morning. He makes himself useful with cups of coffee and tales of the Hammers' victory over Peterborough the previous evening.

And so ends another week in the life of the Blog. Before I forget, I've been asked to write a guest column for the programme for the Sky meeting against Eastbourne in a week or so - better mind my "p's" and "q's" for that one!