REACTION: KEMP HAPPY TO FIND WINNING FORMULA

Poole reserve Drew Kemp was reasonably happy with his night's work as the Poole Pirates put the new track dressing through its paces, retaining their unbeaten home form that dates back to long before Kemp was a Pirate, as they hit the fifty-eight point mark for the third time this season.

Whilst the score was emphatic, the meeting produced plenty of entertainment and basement club Newcastle refused to give up without a fight, but a power finish of four maximum heat advantages in the Pirates favour saw out the meeting, to stretch that unbeaten run, which began in September 2019 to twenty two meetings.

Afterwards, young Kemp, who suffered elimination from the GP2 (the former world U21 competition) at the weekend admitted "I was on different engines tonight. I had an engine that I had been running all year really and last week I had it back from the servicing and it wasn’t how I wanted it to be, so I thought I needed to change a few things and I got one of my other fast engines and it seemed to go well once I got it set-up alright. It was obviously nice to finish on a win and a paid win, and you know it's time to forget about that last place (he finished fourth in heat seven); that's speedway, and things like that are going to happen, but as I say as long as I can finish on a high then that's good." 

Kemp was one of six riders who finished with at least two unbeaten rides, Steve Worrall headlining the score chart with his second successive Wimborne Road paid maximum whilst skipper Danny King suffered just one defeat, that in the opening heat to Diamonds' well-chosen guest Kyle Howarth. It was Howarth, partnered by James Wright who inflicted Richard Lawson's first Wimborne Road defeat in fourteen rides when the visitors gave the Pirates a warning that they were not just going to offer up submission. But beyond Howarth, Wright and comeback kid Lee Complin they had too many weak links and the Pirates rallied with that solid return of twenty points in four heats to see out the affair.

Next up for the Pirates is a tough looking visit on Friday (13th May) to Redcar, the Bears having picked up a league point at Oxford tonight where they went down 47-43. Three league points currently separate the two sides, Redcar, sixth in the table,  having a meeting in hand on Poole (5th).

POOLE 58  - Steve Worrall 13+2 (3,3,3,2',2') ,Danny King 13+1 (2,3,3,2',3) ,Drew Kemp 9+1 (3,0,1,3,2') ,Ben Cook 8+2 (2',1,2',3) ,Richard Lawson 7 (3,1,0,3) ,Zach Cook 5+1 (0,2',3,0) ,Nathan Ablitt 3+1 (1,2',F,RS)
NEWCASTLE 32 - Kyle Howarth 12+1 (3,2,2',3,1,1) ,James Wright 7 (1,3,2,1,0) ,Lee Complin 5 (2,1,2,RS,R,0) ,Matthew Wethers 4+2 (1,R,1',2') ,Max Clegg 2 (R,TS,1,1) ,George Congreve 1 (0,1,RS,0,RS) ,Paul Starke 1 (R,0,1,0)

Full heat details available here