Turner, and Menadue/Dolan championship winners at Gillman

Gillman Media 17 January 2022

Ex-pat Kiwi Jake Turner had his most successful meeting since basing himself in South Australia when he won the Gillman Speedway track championship in Adelaide on Saturday night.

The former three-time New Zealand Under 21 Champion had started the season in good form, and was challenging Dakota Ballantyne and Fraser Bowes as the leading rider at Gillman in the early meetings, but had dropped in form in recent meetings so wasn’t one of the favourites, but never put a wheel wrong as he went through the card unbeaten, winning his five heats, and then leading all the way in the final, in an impeccable display.

Favourites for the championship were local rider Brayden McGuinness, who finished third in the South Australian Championship at the previous meeting, and Bendigo’s Jack Morrison, who had several impressive meetings at Gillman last season and it was Morrison who came closest to taking the title, finishing runner-up ahead of third placed Patrick Hamilton and fourth placed Declan Knowles.

By a quirk of the draw, all four finalists also met in heat eleven, when Knowles, Morrison and Turner were all unbeaten on 6 points, and Hamilton was on 5, and Turner won that race ahead of Hamilton and Knowles with Morrison last.

They were the only points Morrison dropped, to go straight into the final on 12 points, along with Hamilton, who was again impressive, following his semi-final appearance in the state championship, to finish with 13 points.

Apart from his loss to Turner, Hamilton lost his only other point in a surprise result in heat seven when he was beaten by impressive New South Wales newcomer, Michael West.

Knowles was sitting comfortably on 10 points after four rides and was favoured to win his last heat against Jackson Milner and Steve Graetz but went badly off-line chasing Milner and lost a lot of ground which saw him only finish third and with 11 points relegated him to the last-chance semi-final against 16-year-old Milner, again impressive with 11 points in only his fifth senior meeting, Brayden McGuinness (10) and West (10).

McGuinness was fast all night but his losing margins highlighted the difference between being able to ride fast, and choosing the right lines as the riders ahead of him did. He was beaten by just 0.159 of a second by Knowles in heat three, 0.165sec by Turner in heat seven, 0.243sec by Morrison in heat thirteen, and 0.022sec by May for second place in heat nineteen. That is just over half a second, in total, over 4 races, between finishing with 10 points or 14.

In the semi-final Knowles was leading from McGuinness and West when the race was stopped because Milner had fallen in turn three. The order was the same again in the rerun with McGuinness all over Knowles’ back wheel until McGuinness crashed heavily nearing the end of the second lap, reportedly after a clutch failure. This time the race was declared, with Knowles the winner, which was good for Knowles and he’d led both attempts to run the race, but, no doubt, disappointing for young West, but the 17-year-old from Towrang, a village in the Southern Tablelands of New South Wales, has only recently moved into speedway from dirt track so he’d have to be happy with his overall fifth place in his first appearance on the Gillman track.

In the final, as reported Turner led from start to finish but 18-year-old Hamilton pushed him hard and was almost under him on the back straight on lap three but that only spurred Turner to pull away. Morrison, who was in last place at the end of the first lap, got under Hamilton on the last lap to take second after Turner, Hamilton and Morrison were wheel-to-wheel at times.

The Sidecar racing, for the South Australian Division 2 Championship was intense and sometimes hair-raising or heart-stopping, whichever expression you prefer to use. We all want to see exciting racing but sometimes these guys are almost too exciting for the faint-hearted!

After three of their four rides, Kym Menadue/Shane Dolan were on 8 points with Thomas Adams/Jaxon Rayner, Brian Silvy/Damian Egan, Mitchell Spear/Glen Zaworski and Adam Pascoe/Tim Wegner all on 7 points, so it was all to play for in the last round for direct qualification to the final. Daniel Puddy/Byron Mordaunt and Dean Hobbs/Daniel Low, although only on 5 and 4 points respectively, were also looking good and chasing a place in the semi-final.

Hobbs, in fact, should have also been on 7. He’s been riding very well lately and scored an impressive win over Silvy and Puddy in heat 4 but had just marginally crossed the pole line in turn four during the race and was excluded, costing him those 3 points.  

First on track in the last round were Spear and Puddy in heat ten and in a thrilling race they exchanged the lead several times right up to the last corner when Spear went under Puddy to take the win and move to 10 points, with Puddy finishing on 7.

Next up was Adams, Hobbs and Pascoe in heat 11 and they finished in that order for Adams to advance to 10, Hobbs 6 and Pascoe 8.

In the final heat Menadue beat Silvy to finish as the highest scorer with 11 points, and Silvy ended on 9.

Menadue dropped his only point in heat six against Adams and Spear. After a wild first lap Spear emerged in the lead from Adams and Menadue but they were wheel-to-wheel until Spear lost his line and hit the fence (but was able to continue the race) gifting the lead, and the win, to Adams.

The semi-final line-up was Silvy, Pascoe (now riding Tim Bichard’s bike), Puddy and Hobbs and it was a surprisingly tame race after all that had gone on in the heats, with Puddy taking the win from Silvy and Hobbs, with Pascoe retiring on the last lap while running fourth.

If the semi-final was tame the first lap of the final, between Menadue, Adams, Spear and Puddy, was anything but, although it was anti-climatic after that. Menadue was the early leader ahead of Spear, Adams and Puddy but in the hectic scramble for places, Adams and Spear collided in turn three. Adams spun out, and Spear ran off the track, which allowed Menadue to set up an unassailable lead, and Puddy to move into second. The race was allowed to continue with Spear and Adams rejoining the race but well behind and Adams, who was excluded, pulled infield on the next lap.

The win for Menadue and Dolan was an exciting outcome for Dolan in particular, as he was competing in his first, and probably last, speedway meeting as a fill-in passenger for Menadue’s regular passenger Eric Melton who was stuck in a 7-day Covid isolation.

The Flat Track Solo class was again dominated by Kyle Machin but he had to work hard in the final to keep his unbeaten run on the night. The riders all went high for the outside line through turn two and Machin, who had started from gate six, found himself in last place. He went around the outside of several riders through turns three and four to move into second place but wasn’t able to take the lead until the start of the last lap. Roy Stout and Seane Chapman had their own battle for second with Stout coming out on top on this occasion after Chapman had been runner-up to Machin in their three heats.