Edinburgh Monarchs struggling second string suffered a cruel blow at Berwick on Saturday when he blew his motor on the way out to his first ride foe Scotland in heat 2.
Not only was he forced to use equipment borrowed from Kevin Little and Ross Brady, but it help limit his contribution to Scotland's win to four points.
The real problem is it was a newly rebuilt engine and had never been used in a race. Stewart felt that his recent points drought had been down to lack of power from his engine and vowed to get a new one to help the fight to keep his place. The new engine blew into a thousand pieces approaching the start line. This puts Stewart back to square one at a critical stage of the season. McDonald added:
"I paid £1,100 for the engine which had been just been rebuilt. On Friday, I thought it didn't feel right. No-one believed me but it just blew to pieces on Saturday. That will cost hundreds to repair and I don't know what to do next."
"I'm embarrassed about how I'm going but I know it's the machinery that isn't right. All that I know is that I'm going to get it right and be scoring big points soon."
It is approaching crunch time for Monarchs who are still involved in all the Premier League's tournaments. The Pairs Finals are to be held at Newport on Sunday 25th July. Then comes the key second leg of Premier National Trophy Semi-Final at Newcastle on Monday 26th July. Next in August, comes the second Southern Tour with Premier League matches at Newport, Reading and the Isle of Wight. This is absolutely vital to Monarchs' championship hopes. Next comes the Fours Finals at Peterborough and the Cup Semi-Final versus Sheffield and hopefully a Premier National Trophy final against Newport. Beyond that lies a possible Cup Final and the Young Shield Play-offs.
Stewart occupies a critical position in the difficult number 2 position and should be involved in all the above matches bar the Pairs and the Fours. It is to be hoped that he can sort out his mechanical problems and get back to scoring the points as he did in May.