Doyle and Holder second and fourth

Aussies Jason Doyle and Chris Holder have finished second and fourth in the Swedish Speedway Grand Prix at Malilla’s G&B Arena on August 14. The event was won by triple world champion, American Greg Hancock.

Doyle has now moved up alongside reigning world champion Tai Woffinden in the championship standings, with the equal second on 71pts behind Hancock. Holder is fifth on 62pts.

Five rounds still remain, including the big finale at Etihad Stadium in Melbourne on Saturday, October 22.

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Doyle was delighted to have overcome a back injury suffered in a Swedish league meeting on August 9. He said: “I struggled with an injury that has been playing on my mind since Tuesday. I hurt my back, so I didn’t do practice. Maybe that was a good thing because it rained on Saturday and the track was totally different.

“If someone said to me I’d have 17pts from the Malilla Grand Prix, I’d have bitten their hand off. It was a very difficult meeting, to be honest. But in the end, I had four gate ones and it went well. That’s speedway – sometimes it can work for you with the gate choices. The bike felt very good and my team worked very hard.”

Meanwhile, 46-year-old Hancock ended his 21-year wait for a Speedway Grand Prix win in Sweden, his adopted homeland during the European speedway season.

The Californian has now won Speedway Grand Prix rounds in 11 different countries, and this was a hard-earned triumph after he battled past Doyle to hit the front in the final.

He said: “All I could think is I wanted to keep building momentum and not try to do anything too fast, otherwise I could have killed off the speed, given the way I had the bikes set up.

“Doyley was there all the time and I kept waiting for him to shut the door. But I think he felt quite comfortable where he was.

"I just managed to get one good corner out of it where he saw me. I managed to push him up and make a nice cutback. Plan B had to come into action quickly and it worked.”

Piotr Pawlicki finished in third position ahead of Holder.

The next round will be held in Poland on August 27.

FIM SPEEDWAY WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS: 1 Greg Hancock 83, 2 Tai Woffinden 71, 3 Jason Doyle 71, 4 Maciej Janowski 64, 5 Chris Holder 62, 6 Bartosz Zmarzlik 61, 7 Antonio Lindback 60, 8 Piotr Pawlicki 50, 9 Peter Kildemand 47, 10 Nicki Pedersen 43, 11 Matej Zagar 42, 12 Fredrik Lindgren 42, 13 Niels-Kristian Iversen 41, 14 Andreas Jonsson 39, 15 Chris Harris 23, 16 Patryk Dudek 8, 17 Danny King 7, 18 Anders Thomsen 5, 19 Peter Ljung 4, 20 Vaclav Milik 3, 21 Denis Stojs 1, 21 Nick Skorja 1.