PIRATES DOUBLE UP AFTER TAMING THE TEN POINT TIGERS

Birthday boy Gary Havelock claimed he "couldn't remember having a nicer present, at least in recent memory" as he celebrated the Pirates winning the SGB Championship league title and the second part of their 2021 double success.

53 year old Havelock added, "All these boys have been an absolute pleasure to work with and I would like to thank all the mechanics who do so much behind the scenes but often don't get a mention. But also, I think the whole Poole club deserves this success. What a team, what a set of fans too. I haven't been here for every meeting but the atmosphere that there has been on the occassions I have been down has been incredible."

Havelock, deployed by the Poole management to undertake team manager duties when the Pirates were racing in the North had watched the Pirates steadily write off the ten point deficit they faced, after Tuesday's defeat in Glasgow and levelling the aggregate scores after eight heats, leaving a seven heat shoot out, effectively, to determine the destiny of that league title. 

Claiming four heat advantages and sharing the other three heats saw Poole comfortably over the line, the Cook brothers, guest Zach and regular Pirate Ben combining for a 5-1 in heat fourteen to mathematically confirm the Pirates as champions.

The night was set to end emotionally for the retiring Rory Schlein as he led in the early stages of his final ever UK ride but visiting number one Craig Cook was determined to spoil the party. But Poole won the second leg 56-34 to give them the aggregate success in the play-off Grand Final with a score of 96-84.

Co-promoter Dan Ford revealed, "I was quietly confident going in to this meeting that we could win this title. I know this bunch of lads and what they are capable of and just knew if they went in to this and rode like they have done so many times this season that they would come through with the victory. I knew they were up for it and Rory sent a message yesterday to the WhatsApp group that was so emotional it even had me wanting to get out there on a bike and make it happen. He wanted to go out with a bang after his 21 years of racing over here and look, we have done it and it feels great."

Scorers:
POOLE 56, S.Worrall 9+1 (3,3,2',1), D.Hume 3+1 (2',0,1), R.Schlein 11+1 (2,3,1',3,2), B.Cook 6+2 (1',1,2,2'), D.King 11+1 (2,3,2,3,1'), Z.Cook 7+1 (3,0,1',3), B.Basso 9+1 (1,1',3,3,1)
GLASGOW  34, C.Cook 11 (1,2,3,2,3), S.Jensen  0 (0,0,0), B.Nicol 4 (0,2,0,2,0), T.Brennan 6+1 (3,1',1,1), R.Wells 4+1 (3,1',0,0), M.Nowak 6 (2,2,2,0,0), C.Bailey 3 (0,0,3,0)
 

Full match report and heat details here