It has been officially confirmed that Monarchs have qualified for the fours final to be held at Peterborough next Month on Sunday August 6th. This is the ninth time in ten years that Monarchs have qualified for the event. The exception was 1996 when Edinburgh raced as the Scottish Monarchs at Shawfield in Glasgow in the top division. That year Monarchs missed out in a very strong Northern Group including Bradford, Hull, Middlesbrough and Sheffield.
Edinburgh are in Group B and will be represented by Peter Carr, Robert Eriksson, Kevin Little and Ross Brady plus a reserve selected from Blair Scott, Will Beveridge and Christian Henry. Also in Group B are Exeter who are likely to be represented by Michael Coles, Mark Simmons, Graeme Gordon, and one other. The Isle of Wight (Ray Morton, Danny Bird, Adam Shields, and Scott Swain) plus Berwick (Alan Mogridge, Paul Bentley, David Meldrum and probably new signing Jorg Pingel) make up the semi-final group.
Group B contian two powerful teams in the holders Sheffield (Sean Wilson, Robbie Kessler, Simon Stead, and Paul Lee) and Workington (Carl Stonehewer, Mick Powell, Brent Werner, and Peter Karlsson). Sheffield have a doubt over Robbie Kessler who could be out for six weeks after sustaining an injury on the continent. Also qualified for this group are Newcastle (Bjarne Pedersen, André Compton, Stuart Swales and Jesper Olsen) and puzzlingly, Swindon (Paul Fry, Neil Collins, Martin Dixon, and one other).
The recent one year ban on Swindon number one, Frank Smart, after testing positive for amphetamines really ought to have ruled out the Robins from this tournament. However Smart's nine point plus average appears to have been included despite it being partially down to illegal performance enhancing drugs. Roger Lobb of Exeter also fell foul of the drug test but is insisting on a test of a second sample.
In previous years, qualification for the finals was the result of local rounds in regional groups. This year, the qualifying round were scrapped despite the opposition of several of the northern tracks. The top eight teams were seeded through to the semi-finals on the basis of the August Green Sheet averages of the top four riders from each track.
This undoubtedly has diminished the tournament in the eyes of many supporters. Some feel that the the local qualifiers ought to be reinstated for next year and if not that the competition be scrapped. The Edinburgh Fours used to be the highlight of the season especially when the Berwick, Glasgow and Newcastle legs were all held over a single weekend.