Australasian Dirt Bike — January 2018

162 | JANUARY 2018 http://www.adbmag.com.au

much pain that he was put on a
stretcherafterwardsandtakenback
to hospital.
AfterhisheroicsinHorsens,Doyle
hadamonthbeforethenextGP,
althoughtherewasthesmallmatter
ofaWorldCupin-between,during
whichDoylehadtowithdrawfrom
thesemi.TheAussieteamfailedtogo
straight through to the final and was
forcedintoarace-offinLezno.
Despite still hobbling around on
crutches there, Doyle top-scored for
theAussies.Sadly,itwasn’tenough
andwemissedoutonthefinalforthe
firsttimesince2010.GrandPrix
action resumed in Cardiff on 22 July,

with Doyle finishing second to take

the championship lead.

After three podium finishes, Doyle

arrivedbackinPoland,forthe

penultimate round.

Whilewehaven’theardDoylesayit

himself, there is a good chance that

he was a tad nervous that night.

Perhapsthat’swhyheonlyscored10

pointsandmissedthefinalforjust

thesecondtimeintheseason.

Maybe he was just surviving.

Despiteaquietnight,Doylestillleft

Polandwitha14-pointleadover

Dudek. He needed just seven more at

EtihadStadiumtoclaimthetitlefor

Australia as the series staged a

Melbourne final for the third year

running. Strangely, there wasn’t much

domestic press about Doyle outside

the motorcycle media. His face should

have been plastered everywhere,

encouraging Aussies to support their

very own speedway hero.

TOP SCORE

But that wasn’t the case and when

just 20,000 fans turned up to the

50,000-seat Etihad Stadium, you

could almost hear the organisers

tearing up their cheque books.

The fans who did turn up were loud

and enthusiastic, but the 30,000

empty seats painted a bleak picture.

TITLE WRAP I SPEEDWAY GP

Chris Holder got his bike off the track

Doyle was due to undergo further surgery

Jason Crump interviews Rohan Tungate

It seems like every

year I’m ending up

in hospital