REPORT: Night of bad luck for Oxford Spires

BETGOODWIN Oxford Spires lost their opening home meeting of the 2025 season at the BetGoodwin Oxford Stadium last night (Thursday) – as King’s Lynn won 53-37 on the night to progress by 106-74 on aggregate in the Premiership Knockout Cup.

Spires’ Peter Kildemand crashed out of the meeting in Heat 3, after King’s Lynn’s Nicolai Klindt locked up in front of him and Kildemand clipped the bike of his fellow Dane and came down heavily. Kildemand suffered concussion, which will rule him out of action for nine days, while his exclusion from the re-run was debatable.

There were also tumbles for Rohan Tungate in Heat 6 and Erik Riss in Heat 10, with the latter looping it out of the starting tapes and landing on his back. Add in an engine failure for Rising Star Luke Killeen in his opening outing in Heat 2, and it was a night when little when right for Spires.

For the second successive meeting, the main plus for Spires was the form of young Latvian Francis Gusts at reserve. The 22-year-old is brand new to British Speedway in 2025 and he scored 9+1 from seven rides to add to the 7+1 he totted up at King’s Lynn on Monday.

Gusts won both Heats 4 and 5. In the former, skipper Maciej Janowski held back Grand Prix rider Jan Kvech, while Gusts pulled away, as Spires posted a 5-1. In the latter race, Gusts flew around Richard Lawson and Ben Cook early on for a second successive victory.

Janowski was unbeaten in his opening three outings, including stealing victory from Lawson on the line in an exciting Heat 11.

Charles Wright finished the meeting strongly, defeating Chris Harris in both Heats 12 and 15, including a fine pass in the latter race, to finish second behind the excellent Niels-Kristian Iversen, who dropped his only point to Janowski in Heat 7.

Francis Gusts was joint top scorer for Spires with Janowski and he was awarded Rider Of The Night. The Latvian said: “There were moments in both meetings for Oxford where I have thought ‘I’m on it’. My first two meetings are in England certainly haven’t been bad meetings, but I know I can do more.

“Tonight was my first home meeting, with one only training session beforehand and the track is pretty different than what I’ve been riding in Poland and Latvia. This is a proper English track. But that is what I want, to gain experience. I’m here to learn and today I’ve done that.

“What I like to do in speedway is winning, so it was good to win a couple of races tonight.

“The management is very good here, while I would like to thank all the sponsors. It wasn’t the result we wanted tonight – we always want to win at home – but everyone was working hard down the pits.

“There were reasons why we lost today, such as Peter Kildemand being injured. We will learn from it as a team and do better next time.”

Spires are next in action when they face the Ipswich Witches in the ROWE Motor Oil Premiership at the BetGoodwin Oxford Stadium next Thursday (April 3) at 7.30pm. Witches are led by Russian Rocket Emil Sayfutdinov, arguably the best rider in the world, and 2017 World Champion Jason Doyle.

Tickets are on sale on the Oxford Speedway website at: https://oxfordspeedway.club/tickets/

BetGoodwin Oxford Spires 37: Rohan Tungate 4, Erik Riss 7+1, Charles Wright 8, Peter Kildemand 0, Maciej Janowski 9+1, Francis Gusts 9+1, Luke Killeen 0.

King’s Lynn Stars 53: Ben Cook 5+2, Richard Lawson 9, Nicolai Klindt 3+1, Niels-Kristian Iversen 14, Jan Kvech 7+3, Chris Harris 11+1, Ashton Boughen 4+1.

PHOTO: Charles Wright ahead of Chris Harris in Heat 15 (pic: Steve Edmunds)