OLLY THE CHAMPION

NEWS Sunday 22nd September 2013, 8:18pm

by Mike Hunter

  Edinburgh Monarchs

Craig Cook made a brave defence of his Premier League Riders' title today, making the final, but he eventually finished fourth behind the winner Oliver Allen, Magnus Karlsson and Jason Doyle.

It was a fair result although possibly our old friend Magnus was the most impressive rider overall. He had been top qualifier with 14 points.

Rockets' Oliver Allen came good in a big way, winning his last two qualifying heats, the semi and the final in an excellent display.

No-one could have had any complaints about Cook's efforts. The man who has smashed track records, scored maximums all over the country and topped the averages by a mile had to work hard throughout the meeting.

His dad Will said "We were quite happy with how we did today. Craig tried to approach the meeting in a relaxed frame of mind, and we know you can't win them all."

He had a tough draw with gate four in heat one, but was well away in second spot only to be overhauled by Josh Auty.

Theo Pijper (who finished on four points) showed that gate four can work by racing off to lead heat two, but he lifted on the third lap and was caught by Nick Morris.

Craig had a long wait till heat 8 in which he came second to the flying Karlsson.

That meant that his realistic target was the semi-final, and with wins in heats 12 and 16 he was well on the way.

He was beaten by Olly Allen in heat twenty, and again in the semi final when the Rocket pulled off an impressive outside pass.

With last choice of gate in the final, Craig was left with gate one, which he had actually chosen in the semi.

He was away very quickly - too quickly in the opinion of Mick Bates. He was probably right.

In the restart Craig was in the mix with Allen and Karlsson in the early stages, but he was outpaced and eventually lost third place to Doyle, who also had an impressive meeting.

Expectations were very high but sometimes it isn't your day. Not often for Craig.

So we return to Playoff action against Workngton at Armadale on Friday with a welcome few days off after a very hectic couple of weeks.