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Berwick Bandits v Redcar Bears
Premier Trophy (Group), 22 April 2006
Shielfield Park, Berwick

Berwick 53
1Stanislaw BurzaR3301 ..70
2David Meldrum22*Fx2*. ..62
3Lee Smethills02*31*. ..62
4Michal Makovsky332*33 ..141
5Andreas Bergstrom2*2R2. ..61
6Danny Warwick11*20. ..41
7Craig Branney3322. ..100
Redcar 43
1Gary Havelock316^32 ..150
2Richard Juul1031. ..50
3Tomas Suchanek26^020 ..100
4Kevin Little1*013. ..51
5Chris Kerr1111. ..40
6Jack Hargreaves0001*. ..11
7Daniel Giffard2010. ..30

* = BP. ^ = TR . ! = TS (15m Handicap). # = TR (Points Not Doubled). & = TS (Points Not Doubled, 15m Handicap).

Berwick had new signing Stanislaw Burza at number 1 in place of Adrian Rymel who has been dropped from the side. Redcar tracked the same team for the third night in a row.

Stanislaw Burza’s debut ride lasted two bends when he shed a chain. This left Gary Havelock to win the race from David Meldrum as the Bears took a 2-4 from the opening race for the second consecutive night. Berwick squared the match in heat 2 with a 4-2 from Craig Branney who won from Daniel Giffard and Daniel Warwick. Berwick then took the lead with a 5-1 against the weak Chris Kerr + reserve pairing with Craig Branney winning for the second time in a row and Andreas Bergstrom following him home. The heat 4 score was 14-10.

Another 5-1 followed in heat 5 from Michal Makovsky and Lee Smethills who both made a fast start. Try as he might Gary Havelock could not catch Smethills so the Bears fell eight points behind. The lead stretched to 12 points in heat 6 with another Berwick 5-1. This time it was new boy Burza who scored his first points for his new team ahead of David Meldrum with Chris Kerr third. Redcar then gave a TR to Tomas Suchanek who came up with the goods with a win ahead of Andreas Bergstrom and Daniel Warwick for a 3-6 advantage to the Bears to cut the gap to 9 points. They made further inroads to the Berwick lead in heat 8 with a 2-4 race win. Berwick were in a 5-1 winning position when David Meldrum lost his footing and crashed into the fence. In the rerun Richard Juul headed home Craig Branney with Daniel Giffard picking up the gift third place. This took the score after 8 heats to 29-22.

Any hopes the Bears might have had were crushed in the next two heats both of which finished as 5-1s to the Bandits. In heat 9 Lee Smethills and Michal Makovsky were never troubled as Chris Kerr finished third then in heat 10 it was Stanislaw Burza and David Meldrum who took maximum points from Kevin Little with Tomas Suchanek finishing last this time! In heat 11 Gary Havelock took a TR and had little trouble registering the win. Andreas Bergstrom lost second place when he pulled out with an engine failure so Richard Juul followed Daniel Warwick home for the third place which gave the Bears a 2-7 cutting the home side’s lead to 10 points. Kevin Little then burst into life with a heat 12 race win for a share of the points which took the score to 44-34. It was Gary Havelock again in heat 13. Andreas Bergstrom finally got past his partner, Stanislaw Burza, to pass Chris Kerr but the result was a 2-4 to the visitors who had cut the lead to eight points again. Michal Makovsky continued his rich vein of form with another race win in heat 14 but Tomas Suchanek finished second and, when Daniel Warwick drifted too wide on the pits bend on the third lap, Jack Hargreaves passed him for third place and a shared race. In the last heat Michal Makovsky passed the faster starting Gary Havelock to win by a distance in the fastest time of the night. Stanislaw Burza finished third ahead of Tomas Suchanek for a 4-2 which gave Berwick a ten point lead for the bonus in the return match at Redcar.

Match Report by Merlin