PETERBOROUGH suffered a heavy defeat and another injury setback in a miserable return to SGB Championship action on Friday night.
The ‘T Balfe Construction’ Panthers went down 58-32 at Edinburgh on a night when team boss Carl Johnson was left far from impressed by conditions at Armadale Stadium.
Reserve Tom Bacon was forced to withdraw with a shoulder injury after a crash in the second race of a meeting in which Peterborough could only manage one heat advantage.
That left a team - already operating rider replacement for injured Bradley Wilson-Dean – seriously depleted and only able to provide one representative in two races.
Chris Harris was the star Peterborough performer as he returned to the number one berth with a double-figures contribution.
The three-time British champion reeled off a hat-trick of heat wins but was unable to shine when taking a tactical ride. He brought up the rear in a three-man 11th contest when on the receiving end of a 5-1 from home pair Erik Riss and Josh Pickering.
Jack Holder and Paul Starke provided other race wins and the latter’s fine effort in heat seven also led to the sole gain of the night – a 4-2 as guest Justin Sedgmen came in third.
Team boss Johnson said: “It was always going to be tough at Edinburgh and losing Tom to injury made it even more difficult. He’s hurt his shoulder again and will sit out the rest of the weekend.
“As far as I’m concerned, the meeting should never have started as the conditions were too dangerous.
“It rained on and off for most of the day and the track was like a skating rink. It needed a lot more work doing to it.
“The tactical ride didn’t work out as we hoped, but Chris rode well to win races and Paul also did a very solid job for us.
“It was a night when it became all about gating and Edinburgh were generally quicker out of the starts than us.”
SCORES
EDINBURGH: Ricky Wells 14, Josh Pickering 10+3, Erik Riss 10+1, Ludvig Lindgren (guest) 9+1, Theo Pijper 7+2, Max Clegg 6+1, Mitchell Davey 2+1.
PETERBOROUGH: Chris Harris 10, Paul Starke 8+1, Justin Sedgmen 5, Jack Holder 5, Simon Lambert 4, Tom Bacon 0 (withdrawn), Rider replacement for Bradley Wilson-Dean.
