King’s Lynn rounded off their ROWE Motor Oil Premiership season with a hard-fought 47-43 win over Sheffield, which also saw them take the aggregate point.
The PSH Environmental Stars secured victory on the night when the flying Ben Cook won Heat 14 with Richard Lawson third, but a 4-2 to the Tigers in Heat 15 left the aggregate scores level.
Tigers skipper Josh Pickering was third in that race after a ding-dong scrap with Cook, but crucially in the additional race Cook and Jan Kvech managed to keep Pickering at the back to secure the extra point for the Stars.
Stars manager Rob Lyon said: “It was a great way to end the season. We wanted to end on a positive note, and to win the final match and get the aggregate point on a Super Heat is something you couldn’t have scripted, but that’s what we’ve done.
“The team that we’ve had over the last few weeks has been the team we had at the start of the year, and it’s the team that would have done some damage if we’d managed to keep it together.
“The return of Ben was pivotal that and now we’ve won six out of the last seven meetings, and we’ve had a decent season.
“We got to the Cup Final and we beat Ipswich three times, so overall it’s been okay, although every team aims to get to the play-offs, that’s the whole point.
“The boys have done a great job given the circumstances and there’s been a really good team spirit, especially over these last six or seven meetings, and we’ve put up a good show home and away.”
It was a deserved victory with all of the Lynn riders chipping in with solid contributions, with the middle stages of the meeting proving vital.
Sheffield edged the first four races with three race wins in that period, going ahead with a 4-2 from Chris Holder and Nick Morris in Heat 3 as the latter just fended off Chris Harris.
It could actually have been worse for the Stars but both Kvech and Niels-Kristian Iversen passed a fast-starting Leon Flint in Heat 1 to share the race behind Jack Holder.
Stars hit the front for the first time in Heat 5 with a tremendous 5-1 from Harris and Lawson over Holder, and that was the first of a run of six successive home race wins.
Kvech fended off Anders Rowe in the early stages of Heat 6 whilst Cook took a second dominant win of the meeting in Heat 7, which initially looked set for another 5-1 until Morris came through inside Nicolai Klindt for second place.
After Iversen took charge of Heat 8, the next three races appeared to put Lynn in control with Harris heading up a 4-2 in Heat 9 as Pickering edged out Lawson for second place, before Kvech and Iversen combined for maximum points in Heat 10, the latter re-passing Morris to prevent another maximum.
Cook made it three out of three in Heat 11 with an error by Jack Holder impeding Flint as Klindt came through for third, and that put the Stars 12 points ahead.
However, the Tigers were determined to hit back and they did so as the Holder brothers combined to squeeze out Harris from the start in Heat 12 with Cook also no-scoring for the first time.
Another 5-1 to the visitors followed in Heat 13 as Jack Holder took the win and Pickering moved inside Klindt heading into the last lap.
Suddenly, there was a meeting to win again with the scores at 41-37, but Cook and Lawson made things safe on the night with their 4-2 split by Anders Rowe in Heat 14.
Heat 15 provided some frantic racing with Pickering briefly moving into second place before Kvech regained it off bend four, and then Cook and Pickering traded places on lap three with the Sheffield captain eventually holding on for third to level the aggregate scores.
The same four riders took to the track for the Super Heat, but whilst Jack Holder was again the winner, this time Cook and Kvech successfully closed ranks despite Pickering’s best efforts to leave Lynn celebrating maximum league points.
King’s Lynn 47: Ben Cook 12, Jan Kvech 9+1, Niels-Kristian Iversen 7+1, Chris Harris 7, Richard Lawson 6+1, Nicolai Klindt 5, Luke Harrison 1+1.
Sheffield 43: Jack Holder 14+1, Josh Pickering 9+2, Chris Holder 6, Anders Rowe 5+1, Nick Morris 4, Jye Etheridge 3+1, Leon Flint 2.
Aggregate scores tied. Lynn won the aggregate point after winning a Super Heat 5-4.
Lynn will stage one more meeting this season as the stars of tomorrow take centre stage.
The Young Stars Pride of the East will bring the curtain down on the 2025 campaign at the Adrian Flux Arena on Thursday, October 2 (7.30pm).
It will feature three of this season’s National Development Trophy-winning team, along with several other top names from the NDL/NDT across the sport.
The draw was made at Monday’s Premiership meeting: 1 Cooper Rushen, 2 Tom Spencer, 3 TBC, 4 Stene Pijper, 5 Jake Mulford, 6 Calum Mitchell, 7 Will Cairns, 8 Ollie Binns, 9 Darryl Ritchings, 10 James Shanes, 11 Ryan Ingram, 12 Jody Scott, 13 Ben Morley, 14 Harry Fletcher, 15 Ace Pijper, 16 Jordy Loftus.
Full details of the meeting to follow.
