LAKESIDE Hammers, in proud association with The Royal Navy, were scheduled to race at Swindon on Thursday night in a Sky Sports Elite League match prior to facing local rivals, the Ipswich Witches, at their Arena-Essex Raceway on Friday 27th August.

LAKESIDE Hammers, in proud association with The Royal Navy, were scheduled to race at Swindon on Thursday night in a Sky Sports Elite League match prior to facing local rivals, the Ipswich Witches, at their Arena-Essex Raceway on Friday 27th August.

However, the away meeeting at Swindon has now been called off due to the weather.

The Hammers new signing Peter Ljung from Sweden is now expected to be back in action for the Club on Friday following his wrist injury sustained in the recent away match against the Witches. Paul Hurry, however, is sidelined for the rest of the season with two broken legs plus the Club have been informed by the Rye House promotion that Chris Neath, their official No.8, injured his back in his fourth ride crash last Saturday at Rye and is, therefore, not available. The Hammers Management needed to book in guests to come in at reserve for both the planned visit to Swindon and the home match against the Witches. They chose young Australian rider Sam Masters, who competes for Somerset in the Premier League, to come in for the now postponed Swindon trip with Canadian Kyle Legault as the choice for the important home match against Ipswich tomorrow. Legault, who rides in the Premier League for South Wales club, the Newport Wasps, rode at the Arena-Essex Raceway last month for Belle Vue against the Hammers and looked impressive scoring seven points from his six rides.

For Friday’s home match against Ipswich the Witches field British Internationals Scott Nicholls and Daniel King , Poles Chris Slabon, (who was brought up in Canada), Robert Miskowiak and Dawid Stachyra, Swede Linus Sundstrom, (who doubles up for the Suffolk club and rides also for Rye House), plus Ales Dryml from the Czech Republic.

Looking further ahead, the Elite League Best Pairs Championship takes place at Ipswich on Saturday 4th September at 7.30pm. The Hammers will be represented by Adam Shields and Jonas Davidsson. Unfortunately Lee Richardson is unavailable due to a personal off track prior engagement on that day.

The action gets underway against the Ipswich Witches in the important Sky Sports Elite League match on Friday at the Arena-Essex Raceway at the slightly later time of 8.15pm. However, for those fans who are able to get to the Raceway earlier there will be the added attraction, starting at 7pm, of six heats of veterans racing in the format of two teams of four riders over six heats in the famous colours of the Hackney Hawks and the Romford Bombers. The annual collection in favour of the Speedway Riders Benevolent Fund will take place at this meeting with the monies raised throughout the Country used to help injured and paraplegic Speedway riders.