Hammers collect points with comfort

10:48pm Friday 4th April 2008

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Lakeside Hammers 50, Swindon Robins 45

HAMMERS opened their home Elite League account with this fine victory over Swindon, who were comfortably despatched despite the relative closeness of the five point winning margin.

With the Hammers missing Grand Prix star Andreas Jonsson through injury, Swindon lined up fielding the evening's expected high scorer Leigh Adams at number one.

The Aussie didn't disappoint, storming to a seventeen point haul including a from-the-back victory as a tactical substitute in heat eight.

Hammers tracked Davey Watt as a guest for Jonsson and the fast-starting Poole rider gained an early advantage when Adams missed the start in the first heat.

There was a cracking ride from Lubos Tomicek in heat two, the Czech reserve recovering from a poor start to burst past Sebastian Alden and Phil Morris within a couple of laps to join Ricky Kling for a maximum.

A bike failure for Joonas Kylmakorpi lost the Hammers some points in heat three, although another great ride for Tomicek in the next race earned the home side another 5-1.

Jonas Davidsson had made the early running from the gate to assert a comfortable win but Tomicek produced a spectacular effort to pass both Alden and Travis McGowan within a couple of laps.

Hammers moved 14 points to the good in heat six when Watt and Lanham slammed in a maximum and Robins boss Alun Rossiter quickly nominated Mads Korneliussen for a tactical ride.

When that move failed to yield the expected big advantage, Rossiter threw in top man Adams off of fifteen metres as a tactical substitute. In a top-class display of speedway, Adams rounded team-mate James Wright before passing Tomicek on the second lap and Lanham on the final circuit.

The Hammers responded quickly through Shields and Kylmakorpi, swooping around the field on the first corner for another emphatic maximum.

That proved to be the Hammers' final advantage of the evening as the Robins outscored them over the course of the remaining six heats to produce the close final scoreline.

"It's a good start to our home league campaign," said team boss Jon Cook. "We took our feet off of the pedal a little bit in the second half of the meeting, but nonetheless a winning start is obviously very important.

"We've got another busy week next week and I've booked in some top-line replacements for Andreas (Jonsson) - Jarek Hampel at Poole, Davey Watt at Swindon and Chris Louis here next Friday against Poole."

Hammers: Davey Watt 8; Leigh Lanham 5+1; Adam Shields 12; Joonas Kylmakorpi 5+2; Jonas Davidsson 10; Ricky Kling 5+2; Lubos Tomicek 5+3.

Robins: Leigh Adams 17; James Wright 0; Troy Batchelor 8+2; Mads Korneliussen 14+1 Travis McGowan 2; Phil Morris 4+1; Sebastian Alden 0.

Heat-by-heat:

1: Watt, Adams, Lanham, Wright (4-2) (4-2) 57.9

2: Kling, Tomicek, Morris, Alden (5-1) (9-3) 59.5

3: Shields, Korneliussen, Batchelor, Kylmakorpi (3-3) (12-6) 58.6

4: Davidsson, Tomicek, McGowan, Alden (ret) (5-1) (17-7) 59.3

5: Adams, Shields, Kylmakorpi, Wright (3-3) (20-10) 58.4

6: Watt, Lanham, Morris, McGowan (5-1) (25-11) 59.2

7: Davidsson, Korneliussen (tactical ride), Batchelor, Kling (3-5) (28-16) 58.9

8: Adams (tactical substitute), Lanham, Tomicek, Wright (3-6) (31-22) 60.2

9: Shields, Kylmakorpi, Morris, McGowan (5-1) (36-23) 58.6

10: Korneliussen, Watt, Batchelor, Lanham (2-4) (38-27) 58.5

11: Adams, Davidsson, Kling, Wright (3-3) (41-30) 58.9

12: Shields, Batchelor, Morris, Tomicek (3-3) (44-33) 58.8

13: Adams, Davidsson, McGowan, Watt (ret) (2-4) (46-37) 58.9

14: Korneliussen, Kylmakorpi, Kling, Alden (3-3) (49-40) 58.3

15: Batchelor, Korneliussen, Shields, Davidsson (1-5) (50-45) 58 .8