Arena Essex suffered a heavy defeat last night when they were beaten 57-38 by Belle Vue in Manchester.
Only Mark Loram looked capable of sustaining a meaningful challenge to the lowly-placed Aces, although Dean Barker did provide one of the Hammers only two race winners.
His success came in heat 10 after the rider was given a tactical ride when the visitors found themselves trailing 35-21 and the rider responded by trapping quickly to hold off the hard challenging Rory Schlein with Paul Hurry in third place to record the Hammers second heat advantage of the night.
Arena Essex opened the meeting with two shared heats, but then conceded successive heat maximums before Loram was immediately given a tactical ride, although the manoeuvre failed to produce the anticipated points with Joe Screen holding his opponent at bay as Loram tried to switch inside to no avail.
Missing the services of Kelvin Tatum, the Hammers again used Glasgow's Shane Parker as a guest and he battled well to gain four bonus points in a consistent showing.
Loram apart, Arena had no answer to the Aces' big two of Jason Crump and Screen whilst the home side's choice of reserve, Scott Robson, proved inspired as he completed the meeting unbeaten by an away rider in his five rides.
Published Tuesday July 27, 2004
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