Rye House51

Edinburgh39

(Speedway Premier League)

RYE HOUSE skipper David Mason dragged himself from his sickbed on Saturday to record an excellent paid 11 score against Edinburgh at Hoddesdon.

The Rockets reserve had been laid low by a kidney infection, from which he is still recovering, but answered the call to ride for a Rye House team which had already lost Scott Swain to a stomach bug.

Promoter Len Silver said: "David was very tired after Saturday but his condition is improving. When you consider he wasn't 100% fit, to get paid 11 points was terrific.

"We expect Scott Swain to be back in the team which will face Reading on Sunday and we have applied to the management committee to have him declared eligible again.

"The Racers have named Jason Bunyan in their line-up which surprised me immensely because I thought he had a broken shoulder, but we will see what we will see."

The Rockets face the Reading Racers on Sunday afternoon at 3pm in a Premier League clash which is a change from their usual Saturday night racing.

Against Edinburgh the Rockets were in control from heat two onwards after David Mason and Chris Courage recorded the first of five Rye House heat maximums.

By heat 14 the Rockets had opened up a 16-point lead sitting on the right side of a 50-34 scoreline, but not for the first time this season their efforts were let down by a disappointing heat 15.

In probably the best race of a fairly low-key night, Frede Schott made the gate to head Scott Robson with Peter Carr in third, but the Edinburgh man forced his way through to the front for a Monarchs 5-1 which reduced the deficit to 12 and set up a Scottish charge on the bonus point later in the season. Meanwhile there was some surprise on the Hoddesdon terraces that next Monday's clash with Mavericks is to be a league clash and not the much-anticipated Knockout Cup meeting between the two sides.

Back in 1999 when Rye House first relaunched in the British Speedway there was a clash between the then Hoddesdon promotion and the Newport promotion about the staging of a separate league and cup fixture rather than a one meeting takes all affair.

July 10, 2002 11:00