Determined display gives Monarchs a deserved three points

REPORT Friday 26th April 2024, 11:24pm

by Mike Hunter

  Edinburgh Monarchs

In their first home outing of the season the Stellar Monarchs took a grip on this match right from the off and never looked like missing out on either the match points or the aggregate bonus, taking 11 race wins on the night including the first five by which point they had established an 8-point advantage.

Edinburgh team manager Alex Harkess was happy to take the 3 series points, but even more so with what he saw in his team tonight. "That was just what we were looking for, they were really fighting for everything, so determined. They were just never going to give up and I never doubted they would take the points. Everyone did their bit. Young Max James was having engine trouble towards the end but I wanted to keep him in the rides because he deserved the encouragement."

Berwick certainly did not have their troubles to seek, as they lost both Jye Etheridge and Drew Kemp when they piled in to the fence together in heat 7. They were able to cover the losses to some extent with IRR and the use of Bastian Borke for additional rides, and in terms of the match score perhaps the bigger problem had been Danyon Hume failing to leave the start in heats 1 and 5. Hume won two of his other races.

There were some terrific tussles during the evening starting with Josh Pickering's opening heat win from the back against Bandits' guest Kyle Howarth. He stormed through on the inside entering lap three.

The home reserves and the Thomson-Castagna pair both added 4-2 victories which put Monarchs ahead on aggregate, a position they never lost. For Kye Thomson the night was his best display for a while – in fact since the last Berwick visit in July 2023!

Also on song was Justin Sedgmen, who led Rory Schlein all the way in heat 4 and gated like his old title-winning self all night.

Bandits brought in Howarth alongside Schlein for heat 9 to try to close the gap, 8 at that point on the night, but a storming ride by Thomson ensured that there was no gain for the visitors.

Heat 10 was if anything more significant. Hume and Borke for the injured Etheridge and Kemp didn't seem too much of a weakening but the Monarchs' pair hit them hard. Pickering stormed off ahead while Lasse Fredriksen (already battered from a heat 6 first bend exclusion) fought a thrilling battle with the Bandits before securing the paid win.

At 12 points up it was almost all over, confirmed as Thomson won heat 12 followed by a 5-1 for Sedgmen and Pickering over Schlein and Howarth.

Castagna won his customary heat 14 before we had a thriller to finish with. The Monarchs' top two went ahead again on the first lap, but this time track expert Schlein was determined not to miss out, fiercely passing Pickering then storming inside Sedgmen for a tremendous victory.

Pickering had said early on that he wanted to see the fans with smiles on their faces, and after this impressive display that would certainly be true of the home support. The Bandits will live to fight another day.

Full Result Details