Peter Carr announced last night that he has committed himself to Monarchs for a further season.
This was announced to a near 2,000 crowd at Armadale last night at his 20 year Testimonial meeting "The Motor Show". This has ended the rumours that Carr was set to quit Monarchs after the Testimonial. Carr said:
"I was always thinking about coming back. I'm still very keen. I don't think this year has gone well, it's gone downhill a bit and I hope I can it out of that. We have two cup finals coming up and I would like to win them both."
"I know the things I have to change for next year in order to give me more time and so restore my enjoyment of the sport. The Edinburgh fans are great. I'll never turn my back on them. When I retire it will be at Armadale.
Peter Carr has had something of a mixed year so far in 1999. While his Armadale form has been outstanding, he has struggled sometimes away from home.
In 11 home Premier League matches at Armadale Peter has recorded nine maximums (three full and five paid). The only visiting riders to beat him on the track at Armadale in the Premier League are Brent Werner, David Walsh, Robert Eriksson, and Les Collins. He has suffered one engine failure and one tapes exclusion.
In the Premier National Trophy, Peter is unbeaten at Armadale with one full and two paid maximums. In the Premier League Cup, Peter has one full and one paid maximum although he was beaten twice by guest Carl Stonehewer in the match against Newcastle.
Away from home things have not gone so well. He scored a four ride maximum at Berwick in the Premier National Trophy and has come up with big scores at Sheffield, Arena Essex and Newport. However he has struggled at Glasgow twice and hasn't shown the authority expected at other tracks.
The probably cause of this is the tyres. The Edinburgh heat leaders are virtually the only ones still using Dunlop hard compound tyres. It is generally accepted that the Barum tyres are certainly quicker out of the gate. The Dunlops do tend to handle better particularly at Armadale. Carr has won a lot of races from the back at Armadale but has not been able to do this with any consistency away from home.
Peter did admit that he was probably have to switch to Barums and learn how to ride with them and win races from the gate.
The Monarchs promotion could now face soemthing of a tough decision for next year. With Carr likely to stay and Ross Brady keen to move up to heat leader, a choice may have to be made between Kevin Little and James Grieves for the other heat leader spot. This could well be affected by the points limit in operation. It could also depend on the staus of James Grieves who was assumed to be likely to move back to Wolverhampton for his Testimonial season in 2000. This is by no means assured as Wolves may not be able to fit James in on a near five-point Elite League average. There will be many who would like to retain James at Armadale with the possibility of running his Testimonial here. There is an equally strong case to be made for keeping Kevin Little who will come on an attractively low average for next year because of his recent mechanical problems.