Edinburgh Monarchs v Glasgow Tigers

REPORT Friday 28th March 2014, 10:00pm

by Mike Hunter

  Edinburgh Monarchs

The Scottish season opener was tight for much of the evening, and Tigers should really have taken the lead, but in the end Monarchs asserted themselves for a solid 14-point victory.

Heat 5 was the one which should have seen the visitors go ahead, but experienced Mark Lemon slipped sideways out of the fourth corner and came down. The scores stayed level for another heat but Monarchs then took over, and only some misfortune for the home side prevented a bigger win.

Craig Cook and Justin Sedgmen won the first two heats, both shared, after which we had three Glasgow race winners through Theo Pijper, Rusty Harrison and Ricky Wells.

Heat 6 was another Cook classic, after he had made a hash of the first lap that was. At one point Rusty Harrison led him by many yards, but you can never count Cook out and he pulled back the deficit to take the three points with a burst down the final straight.

After the scares of heats 5 and 6, the Aussies put things right when Masters and Sedgmen romped away from Theo Pijper for the first 5-1 of the night in heat 7.

In normal circumstances we might have taken Aaron Fox out of heat 8 after two pointless rides, but it had been decided beforehand to let all riders take their programmed rides. Aaron had a better ride, though still at the back, as Stevie Worrall took his first win of the evening.

Derek Sneddon made his first start in heat 9 and for much of the race it looked as though Max Fricke would slot in behind him. It wasn’t an easy ride for Max though with Lykke Nielsen pushing from third, eventually pushing his way through for second.

Monarchs should have extended their six points advantage in heat 10, because Fox had his best ride and even seemed to be closing in on Pijper for second place. Unfortunately his exhaust came adrift and gifted third to Bergé.

The bad luck continued into heat 11 in which Mark Lemon led, pressed by Sedgmen with Masters and Wells battling for third. However Justin’s chain came off, he drifted into Sam’s path and we lost a 5-1, though at least the riders avoided a collision.

So that took the scores to 34-32, and we needed to start building a lead again.

This proved to be well within our abilities. Worrall did brilliantly to go ahead in heat 12 and ride Theo Pijper wide, helping Max through for a 5-1.

This was repeated in heat 13 with Sam leading and Craig filling the gaps, preventing any real challenge from Wells or Harrison.

So the win was in the bag, and Derek celebrated with a heat 14 win, though he didn’t have a lot to spare over Anders Thomsen. Tigers’ reserves were proving to be their brightest performers. Justin Sedgmen had clutch problems in this one but still took third comfortably.

Craig Cook completed his paid maximum in the final heat after passing Wells early on, and Sam took the point from Theo Pijper who had faded after a bright start to the evening.

Full Result Details