EUROPEAN REPORT - Week 9

Image courtesy of Taylor Lanning Photography

Mulford has now been joined by Dan Thompson, who missed the qualifier after breaking his scaphoid in a British Under-21 Final crash, but has now been handed one of the three permanent wild cards for SGP2.

Thomspon made his SGP2 debut as a replacement rider in last season’s final round in Torun, where he just missed out on the semi-finals, and he now heads into all three rounds in 2025 at Malilla, Riga and Vojens – giving him every incentive to complete his recovery in time for the opener in early July.

He said: “It was one of my aims for this year to compete in the series, but unfortunately I had to withdraw from the qualifier due to my injury a week prior to the meeting.

“However, I’m massively grateful for this opportunity.

“Recovery from my injury is going well – I’m having scans later this week. I have been having additional treatment to speed things up, so all being well I should be back in the next two weeks.”

The final qualifying meeting had taken place at Debrecen last weekend with Norick Blodorn leading the riders to make it through with a 15-point maximum. Luke Killeen represented Great Britain, scoring three points.

Meanwhile Mulford rode at Abensberg in the GP Qualifier on Monday and most creditably got a race win to his name in Heat 10 when he took the flag ahead of Glenn Moi, Eber Ampugnani and Nicolas Vicentin.

Home racer Kai Huckenbeck topped the list of qualifiers ahead of Michael Jepsen Jensen, Jack Holder, Dominik Kubera and Erik Riss, all of whom advance to the GP Challenge.

There were two other Qualifiers on Saturday, taking place at Zarnovica and Lonigo where the latter event saw Tom Brennan narrowly miss out on a top five place.
Brennan scored seven points and was left to rue mechanical trouble in his fourth ride when he was set for a victory which would have taken him through.

It would also have helped the organisers who were faced with overseeing an extended programme of four run-offs for the final qualifying place after five riders finished on ten points.

Kevin Wolbert eventually overtook Paco Castagna in the deciding race to take a GP Challenge place alongside Mateusz Cierniak, Francis Gusts, Rasmus Jensen and Jan Kvech.

In Slovakia, the qualifying places were taken by Anders Thomsen, Matej Zagar, Kacper Woryna, Martin Vaculik and Andzejs Lebedevs, with Adam Ellis scoring four points.

The weekend action in the PGE Ekstraliga produced some dramatic stories, including a first defeat of the season for champions Lublin as once again they dropped points at Torun in front of a massive crowd.

The home side were 48-42 winners with Robert Lambert in double figures as he scored ten points from five rides, with in-form Patryk Dudek (13+1) and Emil Sayfutdinov (10) also impressing.
Sayfutdinov’s score came despite a controversial exclusion after Bartosz Zmarzlik went down when the Torun rider came through strongly on the inside.

Zmarzlik scored 15+1 from six rides but his other Grand Prix team-mates failed to shine, although Lublin did come away with the bonus point, and they then moved four points clear at the top by winning their re-arranged fixture at Gorzow on Tuesday by a convincing 54-36 scoreline.

Back on the circuit where he spent the majority of his career, Zmarzlik conceded a 5-1 in his opening ride to Lebedevs and Thomsen, but then rode unbeaten for the remainder of the meeting to finish on 13 points.

Reserve Wiktor Przyjemski added 10+2, with fellow youngster Cierniak on 10+1. Vaculik collected 13 from six rides for the hosts.

Meanwhile Dan Bewley was involved in an extraordinary meeting for injury-ravaged Wroclaw away they went down 46-31 at Czestochowa in a match which will go down in history, in many cases for the wrong reasons.

There was a delay to the start after heavy rain and track work, and when it went ahead there were a series of incidents which included two red cards and one yellow card. Wroclaw’s Bartlomiej Kowalski was first to be thrown out of the meeting by referee Bartosz Ignaszewski when he was adjudged to have stayed down deliberately after falling in his first ride. The visitors were already without the injured Brady Kurtz, as well as Jakub Krawczyk and Marcel Kowolik, and in Heat 8 Artem Laguta suffered a heavy crash and took no further part.

Then the meeting boiled over in Heat 14 when Philip Hellstrom-Bangs crashed into Maciej Janowski, in a move which earned him a yellow card for dangerous riding, whilst Janowski saw red literally as he threw a glove at a track official as a reaction to the accident from which both avoided serious injury.

The match was curtailed before any re-run with the result standing, Bewley scoring eight from five rides for Wroclaw whilst Woryna top-scored for Czestochowa with ten.

Elsewhere, Rybnik’s problems deepened as they went down to a 53-36 home defeat against Zielona Gora with Nicki Pedersen involved in angry words in the pits after he failed to complete his final ride, which deprived visiting rider Jensen of a bonus point behind his team-mate Przemyslaw Pawlicki.

Pawlicki scored 13 from five for Zielona Gora, who are now up into the top four, with Damian Ratajczak also impressing on 12+1, whilst Maksym Drabik top scored for Rybnik on 13+1, but they are now three points adrift at the bottom.

The other weekend fixture saw Gorzow edge out Grudziadz 50-40 in a tense encounter with upcoming GP wild card Oskar Paluch scoring 13 points and Vaculik adding 12. Jepsen Jensen racked up 14+1 from six rides for third placed Grudziadz.

The following day saw Bewley top score for a Rest of the World team who were beaten 53-36 in an international fixture with Poland at Rzeszow. Bewley picked up 11 points from five rides, whilst Zmarzlik (13), Przyjemski (11+1), Piotr Pawlicki (11+1) and Dudek (10+2) all reached double figures for the hosts.

There was one fixture in Metalkas 2. Ekstraliga and it turned into a convincing away win for Bydgoszcz, who moved level on points with leaders Leszno with a 57-33 success at Ostrow.

Brennan rode strongly for the visitors with 8+2 from five rides, and Huckenbeck scored a 15-point maximum, but the meeting ended on a sour note when Luke Becker suffered three broken vertebrae in a Heat 15 crash where he was collected by team-mate Frederik Jakobsen.

There was no action in the National Speedway League with matches at Opole, Krakow and Gdansk all postponed.