GILLMAN SPEEDWAY: HUDSON & SPEAR ARE SIDCAR CHAMPS!

Shane Hudson and Mitchell Spear won an exciting final of the Chook’s Custom Grafix Gillman Sidecar Championship on Saturday night, although all the excitement was behind them as Rick Stephens/Nick O’Brien, Kym Menadue/Shane Dolan and Nate Headland/Jaxon Rayner constantly exchanged places in a hectic battle for second place before finishing in that order.

Hudson is the eleventh different rider to win the title in the twenty times it has been run. Only Darrin Treloar (6), Mark Plaisted (4) and Glenn O’Brien (2) have won the title more than once, and all three are multiple Australian Champions, which shows it is not an easy event to win.

The top scorers in the twenty qualifying heats were the 2021 winners, Rick Stephens and Nick O’Brien, with 14 points. The dropped their only point to Hudson/Spear in heat 14.

Hudson/Spear and Menadue/Dolan finished equal on 12 points and were the other two direct qualifiers for the final.

Hudson’s points came from four wins and an exclusion after an alarming crash by Max Howse and April Cottrell in heat ten. Early on, WA visitors Jonah Sita/Jamie Forrest were the surprise early leaders and were doing a good job hugging the pole line to keep Hudson out, but coming out of turn four Hudson eased under Sita and they went slightly up track as they went onto the straight. Unfortunately Howse was making an outside passing attempt on them at the time and he ran out of track and crashed into the fence in front of the officials’ tower. April Cottrell copped the worst of it and went to hospital for some x-rays but thankfully she escaped without any breaks.

Howse was, of course, out for night, and the referee deemed Hudson to be the cause of the accident and excluded him from the rerun which became a match race between the two WA teams, Sita/Forrest and Adam Wenn/Shayne Crowhurst, with the win going to Wenn.

Both were worthy additions to the Gillman programme but had very different meetings. Wenn was fast and aggressive from the start and figured in an exciting first race with Headland and Stephens and led at one point before eventually finishing third, and followed that with a surprise win over Josh Pascoe/Greg Black and 2020 winners Shane Rudloff/Damian Egan. Conversely Sita started slowly before looking very good in the aforementioned heat ten only for his bike to break down, with some fire coming from underneath the bike, on the last lap of the rerun with Wenn.

The fourth highest scorer was 17-year-old Nate Headland, who also scored 12 points but was relegated to the semi-final on countback. Wenn was also in the semi-final with 10 points, as was Pascoe, while Rudloff took the final place on 8 points.

The semi-final was a good race between Headland and Wenn with Headland taking the win from Wenn, with Pascoe third and Rudloff fourth.

The 500cc Solos had an eventful night which resulted in Sam Martin being the surprise top scorer. Although Martin is a former two-time Gillman Champion, he hasn’t ridden for about eight or nine years but he took advantage of some mishaps for Brayden McGuinness and Liam May to top score with 13 points, ahead of Shaun Sampson on 6, McGuinness and May on 4, and Teagan Pedler on 1.

The meeting started with a good win by McGuinness, with Martin pinching second from May on the line after May went wide in the last turn and had to slow briefly to avoid hitting the fence.

For heat two McGuinness came out with the wrong helmet colour on and was put back 15 metres for exceeding the two minute time allowance when he had to go back and change it. Despite his good win in heat one he wasn’t able to overcome the handicap and the win went to May with Martin second and McGuinness third.

At that stage McGuinness, May and Martin were all on four points but things went awry for everybody except Martin in heat three.

McGuinness and May were side by side through turn one but then May, on the outside, fell heavily and his bike crashed into the fence. There were concerns May might have injured a shoulder he’s had trouble with in the past but he was okay. Not so his bike, however.

The referee was willing to have all five back in the rerun but May’s bike was too badly damaged and he was out for the night. In the rerun McGuinness lost a chain in a shower of sparks going into turn one and Sampson had to lay his bike down to avoid running into him. In the second rerun, without McGuinness, Pedler was second and fell in turn one, lap two and Sampson had to lay his bike down again.

Unfortunately his bike gave her a hefty bump in the back. He was very concerned about hitting her but, although bruised, she still took her other two rides. Martin won the second rerun from Sampson, but full credit to Sampson.

The guy was just a couple of days shy of his 57th birthday but his reactions were quick enough to get the bike down twice in a couple of minutes, and throwing a bike onto the track wouldn’t be much fun at 57. But, like Pedler, he kept going and was rewarded with 6 points. A nice little earner considering he usually has to ride against international riders which makes winning any prizemoney very difficult.

Heat four was another win for Martin ahead of Sampson after Pedler had another scary moment when she lost a chain in a turn while running second and did well not to fall.

McGuinness was back for the final heat but dropped another chain, this time while leading on the second lap so it was another win for Martin ahead of Sampson with a shaken Pedler, understandably after her misadventures in her previous two rides, trailing of a bit this time.

It was an interesting night for Pedler. She only ended up with one point but seemed to step up a level, riding a bit faster and more aggressively, perhaps from a confidence boost of a couple of wins at the opening meeting.

The Flat Track Solos produced some close racing between the front runners, in particular Liam May, Jake Mitchell and Roy Stout.

Fortunately May wasn’t injured in his crash on the speedway bike and was able to continue in the flat track class and top scored in the heats with an unbeaten 12 points. His toughest heat was heat nine in which he and Jake Mitchell were side by side for most of the race.

His second place to May in that race was the only point Mitchell dropped and they were joined in the six-rider final by Aaron Summers (9 points), Dale Knights (9), Roy Stout (7) and Rohan Clark (6). Stout had a win and two seconds but high-sided and fell while leading his last heat which cost him another 3 points. Most impressive of the non-finalists was newcomer Adam Wright who only scored 4 points but was on the pace of some of the finalists.

May and Mitchell repeated their heat nine battle in the final and May looked like clean-sheeting for the night until he seemed to have a mechanical glitch on the last lap and the challenging Mitchell was able to slip under him and take the win. Stout won a similarly close race for third ahead of Knights and Summers.

Harry Sadler beat Darcey Timmis in all four of the Under 16 250cc Solo races, and Riley Stout (11 points) top scored in the Under 16 125cc Solo races, ahead of Ruby Chapman (9) and Owen Chapman (4).