Our boys were in the hunt from start to finish, until a fairytale upset rewrote the script
In one of the most unexpected victories in the history of the Speedway Grand Prix, unheralded Polish newcomer Kacper Woryna mastered a very tricky track in Landshut, Germany, to take an unbelievable victory in an edge-of-the seat round one.
Woryna, who only qualified for this series via a runner-up finish in last year’s Grand Prix challenge, was super fast during the heats and was aggressive on an overwatered track, making courageous passes where others were more cautious.
However, his chances took a hit after a tapes exclusion in his fourth outing, but with night falling and the track improving, he bounced back with a second place in his last ride to make one of the two last chance qualifiers (winners going through to the final to join the top two pointscorers from the heats).
Ironically, he faced off against three Aussies, Jason Doyle, Jack Holder and Brady Kurtz, in the all-or-nothing encounter.
After a fairly even start, a coming together between Doyle and Kurtz exiting the first turn gave Woryna a lead that he never surrendered, much to the dismay of the chasing Aussies.
In the final itself, Woryna faced off against brilliant British rider Dan Bewley (who was unbeaten at that point), reigning champion Bartosz Zmarzlik and the second of the hard-charging Brits, Robert Lambert. The rest is history!
Woryna made a cracking start and won a thrilling final ahead of Bewley, Zmarzlik and Lambert, bringing the appreciative crowd to its feet.
Not surprisingly, the 30-year-old winner’s family has history in the sport. His grandfather, Antoni Woryna, won two FIM Speedway World Championship bronze medals in 1966 and 1970. That was no mean feat back in the days when Polish riders did not compete regularly in the dominant UK league.
Credit to our boys: each of the Australians on show had moments of brilliance, but the narrow track and inconsistent racing surface threw up plenty of challenges for riders who missed the start.
Holder in particular looked lightning fast when he was in front, with Doyle and Kurtz equally impressive.
Victoria’s Max Fricke found the going a little tough, but did have one very neat race win, somewhat against the form book at the time.
A new points system is proving fairly controversial, with heat points basically discarded, but points allocated based purely on overall finishing order.
On a positive note, this system is more palatable to casual fans as it means the winner will always get the most points, which was not the case in the previous iteration.
The best of the Aussies was Doyle in sixth (11 points), followed by Holder (9 points), Kurtz (8 points) and Fricke (3 points).
