PANTHERS promoter Ged Rathbone has thanked supporters for their patience during an extensive delay to Sunday’s meeting.
Floodlight failure on the back straight resulted in temporary lighting being bought in to ensure the remaining races, and the second half, could be completed.
But this took some time to ensure the work was completed to the satisfaction of the teams and the referee, and the meeting was held up for around an hour.
Rathbone said: “Lakeside wanted the meeting abandoned after the floodlight went out, which meant the entry to bend three was slightly darker than it normally is.
“But we’ve got a duty to the supporters who have paid to come in to give them fifteen heats.
“We don’t call meetings off with a few heats to spare, whether or not we are being beaten.
“We’ve been beaten on aggregate this time but what I will say is that we were beaten as a team, which is our team, without any games or whatever you want to call it. We’ll accept that, we can still win a Treble, and next week should be fun!
“So it’s massive thanks from us to everyone who stayed behind, and our apologies for the delay, and also a big thanks to the Showground who helped us at great expense with the temporary floodlights.”