Well this latest trip "Down Under" of mine is certainly proving to be eventful! Arriving at the Gold Coast Speedway for last Saturday's Dave Booth Memorial Shield meeting, trophies having been collected en route, we were greeted by the sight of many people casting wondering eyes were cast skywards as the weathermen had forecast rain to fall at sometime during the day.
The sun shone on the righteous though during the afternoon and the programmed junior heats went off without a hitch as did the pre-1984 sidecar event.
As the day wore on, the clouds gathered above but it was still dry as the evening's programme began with a large crowd flocking in to honour the memory of "Boothy" - a rider who sadly lost his brave fight against cancer recently. Yours truly undertook joint commentating / announcing duties with Rob Darke as we "filled in" for regular track announcer Bob Leyden.
Halway through the evening's proceedings, albeit that the junior semi-finals were completed, it all started to go wrong! The track lights failed, the P.A system went up the swanee (I didn't touch a thing - honest!) and then it sstarted to precipate with avengeance! By then the first round of heats and part of the second round had been completed but there really wasn't any alternative but to postpone the rest of the meeting to the following afternoon.
So instead of my eagerly anticipated Sunday morning lie in yep, you've guessed already, it was up again at some stupid early hour and off to the track again! Of the twenty original riders in the main event, twelve were able to return to complete the programme with others unable to make it for a variety of reasons such as work, booked flights and, in the case of Alan 'Pop' Rivett, who I'm sure many UK speedway fans will remember, the fact that he had to set off on the 2/3 day drive to Perth!
A surprisingly large number of spectators returned - free admission no doubt helped - and World Champion Crumpie and another familiar personnage to UK fans, Scott Smith went direct to the final as the top two points scorers from the heats. The other two finalists were decided by a repechage which King's Lynn's John Oliver won this from Kozza Smith and Josh Grajczonek. Trent Leverington looked certain to claim second spot until he got slightly out of shape just before the chequered flag and Smith couldn't avoid him.
In the final as one might expect, Crump was a tapes to flag winner whilst the others rode three abreast for much of the first lap with Scott Smith eventually forging into second place, Kozza Smith third and John Oliver fourth.
After a few Bundies - well quite a few - it was back here to my mate Gavin's and, yippee a lie in this morn! Gotta ruddy well pack now though as I fly out to Adelaide tomorrow on a Qantas flight. Now why DO Aussies reckon Qantas stands for Queer And Nasty, Take Another Service???
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