Justin Sedgmen, from Merbein in Victoria, will head to Adelaide this Saturday night (2 December) as a hot favourite to win the Littlehampton Clay Bricks and Pavers South Australian Solo Championship at the Gillman Speedway.
Sedgmen, a former Victorian Champion, has never won the SA Championship, but is a proven performer on the Gillman track.
He was runner-up to Troy Batchelor in the championship last season, and third behind fellow international riders Jason Doyle and Rohan Tungate in 2015. He has also been on the rostrum in each of the last three Gillman rounds of the Australian Championship, and last season won the Jack Young Cup.
His biggest challenger looks to be local rider Robert Branford, another former Jack Young Cup winner. Branford won the Cup in 2014, and was runner-up in 2015 and 16, but for various reasons has rarely ridden in the State title and this is his first appearance since he finished third in 2014.
While Sedgmen and Branford are the favourites to win the final, the field is wide open for the other two final berths which will earn the riders eligibility for a visa to ride in the UK if they are offered a team place.
The riders likely to be vying for those two places, are current Victorian Under 21 Champion Jordan Stewart, fellow Victorians Jaimon Lidsey, Cooper Riordan and James Davies, and SA riders Dakota Ballantyne, Robert Medson and Brayden McGuinness.
The Championship will be staged over 20 heats with the top three point scorers going into the final along with the winner of the last chance semi-final for the next four highest scorers.
The Solo Championship will be supported by a full field of Sidecars, with local stars Mark Mitchell/Dale Knights returning to take on the stars of the last Gillman meeting, Victorians Byren Gates/Michael O’Loughlin. Gates/O’Loughlin were unbeaten in the Justin Plaisted Farewell meeting a fortnight ago, an also clocked the fastest one and four lap times recorded this season by the new MYLAPs electronic timing system. Fellow Victorian Neale Hancock is also hoping to take on Mitchell and Gates, and is burning the midnight oil trying to ready after crashing in his opening ride at the last meeting.
This will be the last Gillman meeting before Christmas, with the following meeting not scheduled until 28 December.
To find out more visit https://www.gillmanspeedway.com/
Photo: Justin Sedgmen (left) and Cooper Riordan in a heat last season’s SA Championship. Photo by Judy Mackay.
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