Workington Comets v Edinburgh Monarchs

This was our final away match in the Premier League, and we were racing without Erik Riss or Max Clegg. Considering that, it doesn’t look a bad result to go down by 8 points but in reality the performance was disappointing.

Not in the case of Craig Cook who was adjudged to have touched the tapes getting away too fast in heat 1, but still gained a third by passing Stichauer to finish behind partner Rob Branford. Thereafter Craig dominated his races off any gate and finished with 13+1.

Sam Masters isn’t entirely back in the groove yet but gated well and fought hard. He won heat 4 after Howarth had touched the tapes and he won heat 9 against the formidable Bach-Hansen pairing. Thirds in heats 13 and 156 aren’t to be sneezed at though he actually led heat 15 at one point.

Rob Branford got that second in heat 1 and then won heat 2, an excellent start to the night. He managed to add a couple more and battled in every race.

We had Ryan Blacklock in for Cleggie and he beat Williamson in heat 2, so we can have no complaints there. His other heats were tough ones as we tried to maximise the points out of the reserves.

We needed more from the middle pairing, Kevin Wolbert and Justin Sedgmen are well capable of winning heats anywhere but on this occasion there were no wins, just a series of disappointing rides which included (for both of them) making the start and being passed. They lost a 5-1 in heat 3, and further maximum reverses for Justin in heats 8 and 14 which were the killer heats for us.

He was unlucky to lose second in heat 8 when he stopped just short of the line. But as we all know, a crucial element in our success is a solid contribution from these two in backup to Craig and Sam. For once it was missing.