Round three action in league racing at the LeFevre track was as cold as ice , temperature wise!

I left home in the middle of a torrential downpour accompanied by some pretty fierce winds from the south west. Along with grandson , Plymouth , we made our way to the track through some pretty flooded streets.I was thinking to myself on the way , boy this is misserable and I wouldn't be surprised to see the meet cancelled.

As I got closer to the track , after crossing the new bridge over the Port river , the skys cleared a fair bit and the wind started to abate. At this time I was also thinking about our riverland friends coming all that way for this cold , misserable , wet weather , with the possibility of a abandonment. As it turned out the timing was perfect and the meet got underway and ran til the seniors had finished before the skys opened up again.

On a track , that could only be described as damp and heavy , some pretty good racing took place between the LeFevre Dolphins , (Division four) Lucy Millikin , Andrew Wilkie , Michael Karpany , Shiranta Aston & Georgia Tulloch.Racing for the Murraylands were , Dillon Milloy , Jarad Lillyman , Damien Crawford  & Kimberley Buchanan. Having only four riders against two top clubs , who have five , on a heavy track is going to make it hard.

The third club in the mix was the Findon Comets,who had bought a fairly handy team with them in , Shane Bentley , Todd Clarke , Brayden Clarke , Agus Freeman & Nicole Kinross.

The track had the remainder of any pools of water swept away and a fast sort of a track slowly emerged over the afternoon ,which abated nicely to the extent of brilliant sunshine, they copped it all . The startline was pretty slippery with lots of wheelspin from the older riders making it another equation to be looked at.

Now for some racing!(Div 4)

Heat one.The home side throw Millikin and Wilkie out against the Murraylands pair of Lillyman and Milloy. Lillyman rattles off a great win over Millikin & Wilkie with team-mate Milloy picking up the final point. (HINT!-keep an eye on this Lillyman, he's a flyer!)

progress score ; Dolphins (5) Murraylands (5) Comets (0)

Heat two.Dolphins again race , with Aston and Karpany fronting the tapes against Comets , Bentley and T Clarke. Aston ,who has been flying lately lead the boys home with Bentley second , Karpany third and Clarke Fourth.

progress score ; Dolphins (11) Murraylands (5) Comets (4)

Heat three. Brayden Clarke had a good win over Crawford , Freeman and Buchanan.

progress score ; Dolphins (11) Murraylands (9) Comets (10)

Heat four. Karpany and Ashton are paired again for the Dolphins againstLillyman and Milloy for the Murraylands.Once again that Lillyman name came up trumps over Karpany and Ashton with Milloy picking up the last point.

progress score ; Dolphins (16) Murraylands (14) Comets (10)

Heat five. Millikin pulls out all the stops and bags a good win for the Dolphins over Bentley and Kinross ,who substituted for T.Clarke and Tulloch who also subbed for Wilkie.

progress score ; Dolpins (21) Murraylands (14) Comets (15)

Heat six. Lillyman again , takes the win over B.Clarke , Milloy and Freeman.

progress score ; Dolphins (21) Murraylands (20) comets (19)

Heat seven. Dolphins , Karpany and Ashton took on Murraylanders , Crawford and Buchanan with Karpany taking the win from Crawford , Ashton and Buchanan.

progress score ; Dolphins (27) Murraylands (24) Comets (19)

Heat eight. Millikin again bagged a win for the Dolphins over Kinross , who was subbed for Freeman. B.Clarke picked up third over Tulloch ,who subbed for Wilkie.

progress score ; Dolphins (32) Murraylands (24) Comets (24)

Heat nine. That guy Lillyman does it again with another win for the Murraylanders over Comets Bentley and T.Clarke with Milloy picking up a point.

progress score ; Dolphins (32) Murraylands (29) Comets (29)

Well were halfway through and the homeside has a slight advantage but just have a look what the Murraylands riders are doing, theyre tied with the Comets. These young riders from Murraylands are coming along in leaps and bounds and its good to see them so competitive.If only they had a fresh set of legs to throw in the mix! still it's not over yet and anything can happen in the prevailing conditions.

Heat ten.That girl Millikin grabs another win over Crawford and Tulloch , who subbed for Wilkie for the third time, fourth was Buchanan.

progress points ; Dolphins (38) Murraylands (33) Comets (29)

Heat elleven.And a horrible crash by shiranta Ashton , while she was in a good position caused a DNF.The race was won by B.Clarke over Karpany and Kinross who subbed for Freeman again.

progress score ; Dolphins (41) Murraylands (33) Comets (35)

Heat twelve. Crawford and Buchanan took on the Comets pair of Bentley and T.Clarke who pulled off the only maximum until now .

progress score. Dolphins (41) Murraylands (36) comets (42) boy that fall of Ashtons looks costly now.

Heat thirteen.Sees even scoring between the Dolphins of Millikin and Wilkie and Murraylands Lillyman and Milloy and yes Lillyman won again!

progress score ; Dolphins (46) Murraylands (41) comets (42)

Heat fourteen.And even scoring once again when Karpany wins from Kinross who subbed for T.Clarke . third went to Bentley over Ashton , back up and racing again after her big crash the previous race.They breed em tough down their way!

progress score ; Dolphins (51) Murraylands (41) Comets (47)

Heat fifteen.The comets are picking it up a gear and take six big points by a win to B.Clarke and a third to Freeman over a second to Crawford and fourth to Buchanan.

progress score ; Dolphins (51) Murraylands (45) comets (53)

Heat sixteen.and even scoring again between the Murraylanders of Lillyman , who won making his an unbeaten ride on the day , the only one! well done.His partner Milloy who picked up a point.Karpany and Ashton picked up second and third repectively.

progress score ; Dolphins (56) Murraylands (50) Comets (53)

Heat seventeen.A huge six points goes to the Comets pair of Bentley ,who won and T.Clarke ,who came third over the Dolphins of Tulloch , who subbed for Wilkie and Millikin.

progress score ; Dolphins (60) Murraylands (50) Comets (59)

The Comets , although a point down are in the drivers seat as all they have to do is get both riders home in any position to win. Sounds easy? wait til you see what happened in a div one race today , but thats another story!The Dolphins have finished their racing for the meet and can only sit back and watch from here on .

Heat eighteen.Final race of the meet and the Comets pair of Kinross and B.Clarke take a maximum to finish it off over crawford and Buchanan.

Final score ; Dolphins (60) Murraylands (53) Comets (66)

What a great meeting it was , besides the ellements , these young riders handled it well and some great racing was had as it closes the gaps between the fields.Young Jarad Lillyman would be hard to go past for rider of the meet when he scored almost half his teams score! The best supporting rider ,for me , was Michael Karpany who showed heaps of maturity with his selfless riding,welldone.