Belle Vue sunk by Pirates

Belle Vue hopes of a playoff place took a blow Monday night as the Poole Pirates came to Manchester and plundered the points from the Aces, as a makeshift line up of guest riders including an Ex-Aces rider and an Aces asset in their team saw the Pirates take the spoils 50-40.

Things started off fantastic for the home side though, as Matej Zagar got the jump on fellow Grand Prix star Chris Holder in the first heat as he pulled away from the Poole number one to beat the World Champion with a very quick time, as the Aces got a 4-2 heat win and hoped to build on it.

Sadly for the Aces, two heats in a row saw a home rider touch the tapes and having to start off 15 metres back. First off it was new signing Danish rider Ulrich Ostergaard touching the tapes and in the re run the Guest riders for the Pirates in Ex- Aces rider Josh Grajczonek and Micky Dyer saw the Australian duo score a 5-1 heat win.

Then in Heat 3 it saw exactly the same situation, as this time it was Craig Cook that broke the tapes and was put back in to go 15 metres back as well.

In the rerun Kauko Nieminen took a heavy tumble as his bike locked up on first bend and he went high side over it landing heavily on the track.

The Finnish rider was excluded in the race but was ok to get up and walk away within a minute of the accident.

The second re-run of heat 3 saw Richie Worrall make the gate along with Rohan Tungate as the Pirates scored a 5-1 for a 12-6 lead.

Belle Vue then started to chip away at the visitors lead, as they picked up a 4-2 with Magnus Zetterstrom and Ales Dryml in heat 4 and in heat 5 saw a fortunate 4-2 score line for the Aces as well.

As Poole were on a 5-1 with Holder shepherding Tungate round the track till he fell on the second bend with Holder having to take action in which to avoid crashing into his team mate.

Craig Cook had been all over Holder for the whole race and had the speed on him too.once Holder took action to avoid Tungate Cook happily swooped by to take the lead and gifted the Cumbrian the race win as Nieminen took 3rd place, as the Aces turned a 1-5 into a 4-2 heat advantage.

Three shared heat scores made it still a 2 point match till heat 9, When Maciej Janowski took the heat win as Ulrich Ostergaard battle hard to try and gain on the Polish rider, but lacked the speed and power of Janowski to catch up as Dyer came in third place and meant the Pirates extended their lead in the meeting to 4 points.

Heat 10 got better for Poole, as Chris Holder came in as a Rider replacement for the "Injured" Przemyslaw Pawlicki and Poole grabbed a 5-1 advantage, with Richie Worrall blocking off fantastically Matej Zagar for the whole four laps and earned his second place as the advantage grew to 8 points now in Poole`s favour with 5 races to go.

Heat 11 seen Zetterstrom have a great ride as he looked like his old self, when he  went neck and neck with Holder down the back straight,  before Grajczonek, who then made the error of looking behind to see where his opponent was till he saw Zorro speed past him and take the lead.

Heat 12 the Pirates came back with Richie Worrall showing Aces fans want they hope to see from him next season in an Aces Bid, as he is pencilled in to ride for the Manchester club in the 2014 season at the planned new stadium. Worrall took the race ahead of Cook as Dyer filled in third place for a 4-2 score line. 

The final 3 remaining heats saw a share of the points as Poole had the winners in the rest of the heats with Chris Holder getting the better of Zetterstrom and Zagar on two consecutive occasions.

The Aces now travel to Wimborne Road on Wednesday night to face the Pirates in what looks like a very tall order to get anything from the meeting at all. But the Pirates will be delighted to take the 4 points back down to Dorset and hope to add the 3 points on their track when they have the return fixture there.

Belle Vue Aces: 

1.Matej Zagar 3 3 1 1* 1* =9+2
2.Kevin Wolbert 1 0 3 0 =4
3.Craig Cook 1 3 2 2 =8
4.Kauko Nieminen EXC 1 0 1* =2+1
5.Magnus Zetterstrom 3 1* 3 2 2 =11+1
6.Ulrich Ostergaard 0 2 0 2 =4
7.Ales Dryml 1 1 0 0 =2

Poole Pirates:

1.Chris Holder 2 2 3 1* 3 3 =14+1
2.Rohan Tungate 0 2* f 1* =3+2
3.Przemyslaw Pawlicki (R/R) (RT 2* MJ 3 CH 3 RW 3)
4.Richie Worrall (G) 3 0 2* 3 0 =8+1
5.Maciej Janowski 0 2 3 3 1 0 =8
6.Micky Dyer (G) 2* 1* 1 1 =5+2
7.Josh Grajczonek (G) 3 2 2 2 3 =12