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A look back at 25 years of the Hammers
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Hammers Promoter Ronnie Russell decided to take the big step up into the Elite League in 2004 following a very successful season on-track in 2003.
That in itself meant several changes as the Club changed race night from the traditional Friday to Wednesday to stop the Hammers having to compete against the Grand Prix Series, which had official practice on Fridays.
This move up into the top League also meant that the majority of the 2003 Premier League team had to move on to other clubs, with only Leigh Lanham and Kelvin Tatum from the 2003 side making the move up with the Club. Lanham had been the top points scorer in the Premier League in 2003 and Russell managed to persuade the Ipswich based rider to move full time up into the top League. Tatum had, during his long career, ridden at the very top level and he believed that he could do a job for the Hammers in their first year back in the top flight for eight years.
Gone amidst much disappointment were the hugely popular duo of Joonas Kylmakorpi and Henning Bager - off to Eastbourne and Peterborough respectively - along with Lee Herne and Daniel and Jason King.
Russell needed to sign five more riders plus two stand-by reserves to complete the squad. An out and out No.1 was required and Russell managed to secure the services of the 2000 World Champion Mark Loram. The last British rider to have won the World Title, Loram had had an injury hit 2003 and Russell took a chance where many other promoters had left alone in selecting Loram to lead the Hammers in 2004.
Loram quickly returned to his very best form and immediately became a firm favorite with the Hammers supporters. To back him up, Russell needed two further heatleaders and looked to Dean Barker, who had ridden alongside Loram at Eastbourne in 2003, and Pole Greg Walasek.
Two former Hammers completed the septet of riders to compete for the Club in 2004 - American Josh Larsen and Kent based Paul Hurry. Both were very keen to ride for the Club and publicly stated that they were not willing to ride for any other team. Hurry, however, was unable to line up for the team at the start of the season due to having to recover from an operation on an arm he injured towards the end of the 2003 season whilst riding for Ipswich at Belle Vue.
Russell persuaded Ronni Pedersen, the brother of the World Champion Nicki, to ride for the Hammers until Hurry was fit to take his place in the side.
The season started with a home and away challenge match against Eastbourne in a meeting that was expected to give supporters a guide to how the Hammers were likely to perform during the season. The so-called Speedway Press experts had already decided that the Hammers were going to be at the foot of the 2004 League table, but a single point home victory against the Eagles was followed with a two point away win at Arlington. That win was soon followed by one point aggregate win in the opening round of the Knockout Cup against Oxford.
The opening home Elite League match was an important match for the Club. Not only was it staged in front of a large enthusiastic crowd but it was also shown live to a massive Sky television audience. The standard of racing was excellent and it proved to be a great advert for the Sport in general and for the Hammers in particular. The result, however, went the wrong way as the overall strength of the Pirates finally told and the visitors left with a four-point victory.
A disappointing one-point defeat at Peterborough followed. This was a match that the Hammers could and should have won. A similar result at home the following Wednesday resulted in a run-off for the bonus point between Mark Loram and former Hammer Henning Bager, a race which Loram won,
Swindon were the next visitors to the Arena-Essex Raceway and despite an 18-point maximum from another former Hammer, Leigh Adams, the home side won by six points. An 11 point defeat followed at Wolverhampton in a match curtailed to just 12 heats because of rain with Loram heading the Hammers scorers with an undefeated tally of 12 points.
Lanham and Tatum continued to prosper at reserve, clocking up some very important points. Tatum had already bagged a couple of maximums but had started to show signs of occasional struggle with his old hip injury.
May started badly with a home defeat at the hands of the Ipswich Witches. This was followed with an away defeat at Oxford a couple of days later before home and away wins against Coventry. A 13-point defeat up in Manchester against Belle Vue brought everyone back down to earth with Walasek failing to score. The return match against the Aces saw the Hammers back on live television again and it also saw the debut of Paul Hurry at reserve. This meant a slight reshuffle in the rider order with Leigh Lanham moving up into the top five. A good solid team performance saw the hammers victorious by a margin of nine points but the Aces left with the bonus point for the aggregate win.
June started with a comprehensive 13-point win over eventual league champions Poole. The new rider averages came in for this match and resulted in Tatum moving up from reserve to No.1 ! The Hammer again featured on Sky down at Poole and at one stage it looked likely that they would claim victory in Dorset, having led at several stages in the meeting. Defeat in a last heat decider was difficult to take although they would gain revenge at home with Walasek scoring 25 points in these two matches against his parent club.
A rampant Hammers side easily saw off Peterborough in more live Sky action and everyone began to realise that the Hammers could be a real force to reckon with if all seven riders performed well at the same time. A top five finish in the League, and a place in the end of season play-offs, looked a real possibility. A four point win at home to Eastbourne and a five point defeat away at Swindon still kept the Hammers in with a good chance.
A series of four cancelled meetings due to the weather was to follow but sandwiched between these was the second visit of the season of Ipswich. The Hammers riders were determined to turn round the earlier six-point defeat by the Witches. In a superb meeting the Hammers came out victorious by a margin of seven points. The Hammers went into this match without the services of Walasek (banned due to missing an earlier meeting because of a Polish commitment) and Tatum (his hip injury had worsened to the extent that he could not ride every meeting). However, guest Henning Bager put in a strong performance for his former club with nine points.
July saw Lanham return to reserve with Larsen moving back up into the top five and a win over Coventry. The day after the win over the Bees saw what ultimately turned out to be the turning point in the whole of the Hammers season. On a very wet night at Coventry the Hammers lost by 11 points, gaining the bonus point – but it was a meeting that Hammers riders believe should not have even started due to the saturated state of the track. They finished the match with Larsen, Hurry and Lanham all injured and with Tatum’s severe hip problem worsening.
A win over Wolverhampton was followed by a 19-point defeat at Ipswich, which resulted in injuries to Loram and Barker – an real injury crisis had formed and the Hammers lost at Belle Vue and at home to Swindon.
Defeat at Eastbourne in August saw the end of Kelvin Tatum’s career in speedway after three seasons in Hammers colours. His hip injury had become too troublesome to allow him to turn a bike on the tight British tracks. He did, however, continue with his attempt to regain the World Longtrack Title, which eventually ended in heartbreak when a machine problem on the last lap of the final race in the final event in New Zealand cost him the Title.
Russian Roman Povazhny replaced him an he immediately became a favorite with the Hammers supporters due to his 100% effort on the track. Wins against Oxford and Belle Vue followed before the final Elite League meeting of the campaign away at Swindon in front of the Sky Sports cameras resulted in an eight-point defeat and the end of the team’s play-off hopes.
There was still the Knockout Cup Semi-Final against Ipswich to look forward to – but the Hammers lost both legs to go out. The end-of season finale was washed out when the weather intervened to halt both attempts to stage Leigh Lanham’s Testimonial Meeting.
The Hammers had made a real impact in their first season back in the top flight despite finally finishing in eighth place and Loram in particular had proved to be a superb number one as supporters witnessed some terrific racing by some of the World’s top riders.
Russell considered his decision to move up from the Premier League prior to the start of the season a success and at the end of the year he announced that crowds were up on 2003.
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