It may be raining medals at the Olympics for team GB but its points that Glasgow have been plundering, with a superb 10 league points in three days after a hard fought win over Ipswich.
With Glasgow racking up the miles, with Rene Bach injured and three ex Tigers in the opposition, this looked like a potential banana skin.
However Tigers made a good start. A bizarre 3-2 in heat one after Aaron Summers went from third to first, just as Coty Garcia went from first to last in the space of three bends, then Garcia pulling off, just as James Sarjeant’s bike packed in on the third lap, just failing to get over the line before being lapped!
Nike Lunna passed Joe Jacobs in heat 2, with the returning Danny Ayres just failing to do likewise.
Lunna then took an easy 5-1 with Richie Worrall, after Nico Covatti had crashed in the first staging of heat 3 before Ben Barker easily beat Richard Lawson, with Ayres third to take the score to 15-8.
The teams then traded 5-1s with Sarjeant pinning Worrall to the outside down the backstraight allowing King through and Tigers replying with Garcia flying round Barker in heat 6.
Risager got the better of Lawson on the opening bends in heat 7 and Lunna couldnt find enough grip to pass Covatti, to cut the gap to 5.
Tigers then took a crucial 4-2 back, through Garcia and Ayres.
Garcia appeared in the next two but couldn’t get past Jacobs in heat 9 and was passed by Risager in heat 10, both heats being shared.
King took his first heat win in heat 11 but Lawson and Lunna shut out Sarjeant.
A home 5-1 looked on the cards in heat 12 but while Worrall and Lunna waited on each other down the back straight, Covatti burst past both of them for another 3-3.
Ipswich then took a 5-1 in heat 13 with both Tigers missing the start to set up a nervy finish.
Tigers still had Richie Worrall to come in as R/R and he duly won the race but Nike Lunna behind him produced the race of the day, firstly passing Danyon Hume(who strangely was left in the race) and with the match won, decided to try an audacious pass around the outside of Risager on the final bend to take the 5-1
Tigers then finished the meeting with another in heat 15 to deny the visitors a consolation point.
There’s no doubt that the travelling and extra rides took their toll on the home riders with everyone having at least one bad ride but they showed their mettle to battle through to take the team back to the top of the league.
Worrall and Summers were the main men for the home side, although Garcia and Ayres picked up crucial points, while it was mostly King and Barker who took the fight to the home men, although every one of the Ipswich 1-5 won a race.
With the play off spot all but assured, next week’s big match against Somerset, will give the Tigers the chance to lay down a marker for the rest of the season.
Glasgow Tigers 50 Ipswich Witches 39 Premier League 14/8/2016 Glasgow Tigers Aaron Summers 3 3 3 0 2* 11 + 1 Fernando Garcia R 2* 3 0 0 5 + 1 Richie Worrall 3 1 3 2 3 3 15 Rene Bach R/R 2* 0 0 3 (5 + 1 ) Richard Lawson 2 2 2 1 7 Nike Lunna 3 2* 0 0 1* 1* 2* 9 + 4 Danny Ayres 1 1* 1 3 + 1 Ryan MacDonald DNR Ipswich Witches Danny King 2 2* 3 2* 0 9 + 2 James Sarjeant X 3 2 0 5 Nico Covatti Fx 1 2 3 6 Morten Risager 1 3 1* 1 6 + 1 Ben Barker 3 1 2 3 1 10 Joe Jacobs 2 R 1* R 3 + 1 Danyon Hume 0 0 0 0 0 Heat 1 - Aaron Summers ; Danny King ; Fernando Garcia(R) ; James Sarjeant(X,lapped) ; 56.84 (3-2)(3-2) Heat 2 - Nike Lunna ; Joe Jacobs ; Danny Ayres ; Danyon Hume ; 59.38 (4-2)(7-4) Heat 3 - (re-run) Richie Worrall ; Nike Lunna ; Morten Risager ; Nico Covatti(Fx) ; 57.45 (5-1)(12-5) Heat 4 - Ben Barker ; Richard Lawson ; Danny Ayres ; Danyon Hume ; 57.93 (3-3)(15-8) Heat 5 - James Sarjeant ; Danny King ; Richie Worrall ; Nike Lunna ; 57.0 (1-5)(16-13) Heat 6 - Aaron Summers ; Fernando Garcia ; Ben Barker ; Joe Jacobs(R) ; 56.65 (5-1)(21-14) Heat 7 - Morten Risager ; Richard Lawson ; Nico Covatti ; Nike Lunna ; 58.16 (2-4)(23-18) Heat 8 - Fernando Garcia ; James Sarjeant ; Danny Ayres ; Danyon Hume ; 57.91 (4-2)(27-20) Heat 9 - Richie Worrall ; Ben Barker ; Joe Jacobs ; Fernando Garcia ; 57.45 (3-3)(30-23) Heat 10 - Aaron Summers ; Nico Covatti ; Morten Risager ; Fernando Garcia ; 57.5 (3-3)(33-26) Heat 11 - Danny King ; Richard Lawson ; Nike Lunna ; James Sarjeant ; 57.22 (3-3)(36-29) Heat 12 - Nico Covatti ; Richie Worrall ; Nike Lunna ; Joe Jacobs(R) ; 58.03 (3-3)(39-32) Heat 13 - Ben Barker ; Danny King ; Richard Lawson ; Aaron Summers ; 58.12 (1-5)(40-37) Heat 14 - Richie Worrall ; Nike Lunna ; Morten Risager ; Danyon Hume ; 58.18 (5-1)(45-38) Heat 15 - Richie Worrall ; Aaron Summers ; Ben Barker ; Danny King ; 57.19 (5-1)(50-39)