CHRIS Louis provided a rare highlight for Ipswich as they slumped to another big defeat 63-30 at Poole last night.He had seen his side concede heat losses in the opening six races to trail 28-8 in Dorset.

CHRIS Louis provided a rare highlight for Ipswich as they slumped to another big defeat 63-30 at Poole last night.

He had seen his side concede heat losses in the opening six races to trail 28-8 in Dorset.

But he stopped the rot with a superb victory in heat seven when he went out as a tactical rider.

Louis led from the tapes out of gate one, but Poole's Jason Doyle swept outside him on the second bend to storm into the lead.

The Great Britain international dug deep though, dived under the Australian on the back straight of the second lap to regain the lead and stormed on to take the chequered flag.

Doyle took second with Craig Boyce third and Zibi Suchecki last.

The 6-3 to Ipswich broke Pirates' opening sequence of 4-2, 4-2, 5-1, 5-1, 5-1 and 5-1.

But it only papered the cracks over Poole's superiority and the big gap between the 'haves' and 'have-nots' in the Elite League.

When Piotr Swist and Troy Batchelor threw in another Pirates 5-1 in heat eight over Kim Jansson, it made the score 36-15 and had Witches supporters wanting to check the record books to see if they were heading for their record Elite defeat.

Robert Miskowiak had other ideas, however, and he gated first to win race nine, leading team-mate Marcin Rempala to an Ipswich 4-2.

The two Poles had briefly been on a 5-1 on the second bend, but Bjarne Pedersen split them down the back straight as Ipswich cut their deficit to 38-19.

Jason Crump, returning from a dislocated shoulder injury, reeled off a comfortably 15-point maximum for Poole, who topped their 58-34 home battering of Ipswich in March to go back to the top of the league.

Suchecki was the Witch who got closest to lowering the world champion's colours.

He got out in front off trap one in heat 10 and led Crump going into the first turn. Crump blitzed outside the Ipswich man on the second bend but was unable to put a big gap into Suchecki, who was only a handful of bike lengths behind at the chequered flag.

Suchecki then stormed to victory in the penultimate race, flying outside Doyle on the back straight after the Aussie had led from the gate to grab a 3-3, the only one of the meeting.

The Pole then split Crump and Batchelor in the final race to finish second and joint top score for the Witches with seven points from five rides alongside Louis and stave off an even bigger loss.

Ipswich's 63-30 reverse leaves them with little chance of getting the bonus when Poole travel to Suffolk on August 16.