New year, new venue, same old faces as the Speedway Grand Prix series got under way today. For the only the second time in its history, the series ventured outside of Europe and into the Southern Hemisphere. Western Springs in Auckland, New Zealand played host where Greg Hancock began his title defence with a 22-point haul and his first victory of the season.
Three time World Champion Nicki Pedersen overcame a hard fall in the heats to finish second with bookies' favourite, Jaroslaw Hampel, third and 2009 World Champion, Jason Crump, fourth. The 2010 World Champion, Thomasz Gollob, kicked his season off with four heat wins but could only manage third in the first semi-final. Hampel and Pedersen went through with Emil Sayfutdinov finishing fourth. The other semi-final saw Hancock finish second to Crump with dark horse for the season, Antonio Lindback, third and Freddie Lindgren, who hadn't won a heat, in fourth.
The meeting started with Gollob winning the opening heat with Hans Andersen making his GP series return in fourth. World number two, Andreas Jonsson, began his season with a win ahead of debutant Bjarne Pedersen in second and wildcard, Jason Bunyan, in fourth. Lindback won his opening heat ahead of Lindgren, Hampel and debutant Peter Ljung. The final opening heat was won by the defending champion with Crump in second.
The Australian returned for heat five and won it ahead of Kenneth Bjerre, Lindgren and Jonsson. Nicki Pedersen took heat six with Gollob winning his second heat in two rides in the seventh. The eighth heat was won by the other Australian rider, Chris Holder, Sayfutdinov finished second with Ljung finishing ahead of Bunyan.
Heat nine saw Bjerre's bike pack-up at the start, making it a three horse race. Hampel took it in front of Nicki Pedersen and Holder. Hancock then won his second heat of the night before Gollob took his third victory. Jason Crump finished fourth in heat 12 with Sayfutdinov taking the chequered flag.
Bjerre was once again forced to retire in heat 13 but his fellow Dane, Bjarne Pedersen, showed why he his one to watch this season with his first race win of the season. Hampel then took his second heat of the night ahead of Crump and Lindback did the same in heat 15 ahead of Gollob. The only incident of the night saw Nicki Pedersen suffer a heavy crash under contact from Sayfutdinov. Fortunately, Pedersen could race the restart with the Russian excluded, but the victory was taken by Hancock for the third time.
The American made it back to back heat wins in heat 17 before Hans Andersen rolled back the years with his first heat victory in three years. Gollob then also made it four heat wins with fellow Pole, Hampel securing his third victory in the final heat.
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