Premier League Result (4th May): Glasgow 51 Redcar 39
Tigers briefly went top of the league after a comfortable victory over a Bears side wholly reliant on Richard Lawson.
With Dimitri Berge out after his crash last week, Tigers used rider replacement, while Redcar were at full strength. With the track wet after some early rain, gating would be paramount early on.
Richard Lawson put last week’s poor showing behind him with a tapes to flag victory in the opening heat. Anders Thomsen was always close without looking like passing while Rafal Konopka took third after Kevin Wolbert had stopped on the opening lap while third.
Jan Graversen took heat 2 although Thomsen looked faster but he decided not to take any risks by attempting his trademark pass on the outside. Kasper Lyyke Nielsen took an easy third over Luke Crang.
Theo Pijper won heat 3 and with Mark Lemon passing Hugh Skidmore on the 4th bend of the opening lap, Tigers took a 10-8 lead.
Aaron Summers took Redcar’s third heat win in the next but Anders and Rusty Harrison filled the minor positions ahead of Crang.
Lawson took an easy win in heat 5 and it looked briefly as if Konopka would join him up front but his audacious outside attempt to pass Theo into bend 3 ended in a fall and Tigers escaped with a 3-3.
Summers won his second race in heat 6 but again it was a shared heat as Kasper and Kevin finished ahead of Graversen
Tigers doubled their lead in heat 7 with a Rusty/ Kasper 4-2 with Carl Wilkinson splitting them. Skidmore was poor at the back.
It took three attempts to run heat 8 with referee McGregor unhappy with Graversen’s start and then Mark looped at the gate, taking a nasty fall. On the third attempt, Graversen took the lead with Anders giving chase. On the second lap he took the wide line coming out of bend 4 on the second lap and passed his fellow Dane going on to win easily.
Mark was quickly out again in heat 9 but completely missed the start as Theo took the lead. Crang was surprisingly second with Summers third. Aaron decided to team ride and despite an opening lap attempt by Lemo he easily shepherded his partner around for the 3-3.
With Redcar’s weak pairing of Skidmore and Wilkinson out again, Tigers had to take advantage in heat 10. This they duly did with Anders and Kevin taking an easy 5-1.
With the gap now 8 points, Tigers didn’t want another heat advantage although with Lawson in the race this looked unlikely. However Rusty had a good try on the opening bends but the race was stopped after Konopka took Kasper out on the first bend. Lawson easily took the re-run.
Heat 12 looked like a Bears 5-1 as Skidmore and Graversen gated but Anders rode a brilliant outside line on bends 3/4 and passed both of them in the move of the match.
Tigers now had the scent of victory and easily kept Summers at the back to share heat 13 after another Lawson win.
Anders was brought out again in heat 14 and he made a rare gate to lead. It was Theo’s turn to come from the back, passing both Bears on the inside of the 4th bend on the opening lap.
Lawson duly wrapped up his maximum but only after he held off a quicker looking Kevin who almost passed him down the back straight of lap 2.
Richard Lawson may have scored a maximum but it was Anders Thomsen who was the star of the meeting with his highest ever score in the UK and with some exciting racing to boot.
Lawson received next to no back up with only Summers early on and Graversen later helping him.
Tigers had solidity throughout although Mark Lemon failed to score after his fall.
It was a welcome 3 points and if Glasgow can get everyone going at the same time they could shock a few teams at Ashfield in the coming weeks.
Glasgow 51: K Wolbert 7+2, D Berge R/R (7), M Lemon 3+2, T Pijper 11+2, R Harrison 7+2, K Lyyke 5+2, A Thomsen 18
Redcar 39: R Lawson 15, R Konopka 2+1, H Skidmore 3, C Wilkinson 3, A Summers 7+1, J Graversen 7+1, L Crang 2
Report by Derek Watson