Kent TouchTec Kings' Dan Gilkes took fifth place in the GB U-19 championship meeting at Scunthorpe Speedway on Friday evening (17th. September).
Among the front runners all evening, Dan took two heat wins and two seconds finding just a third place in his third outing (behind eventual winner Drew Kemp and the home-based rider Jordan Palin) keeping him agonisingly out of the top three scorers and so leaving him a single point short of being able to have a shot at a place for a second consecutive year on the rostrum.
Former Kent Kings' team mate, Kemp took the title with a flawless maximum of 15 points - winning the U19 title for a record-breaking third year in a row. The surprise packet was Leicester Lions' Dan Thompson who only dropped a solitary point to Kemp all evening to take the runners up spot whilst a run off was needed to settle third with the in-form Jason Edwards taking the honours from Berwick's Leon Flint. Gilkes took fifth place with two heat wins to Palin's one after the pair tied on 11 points.
Thompson and his brother Joe will be up against Gilkes again this Tuesday (21/9) when title-chasing Leicester come to Central Park.
Of the U19s meeting Gilkes was typically upbeat in his appraisal on how things went. "I can’t complain about the result on the night, I was happy with the way I rode and me and my team definitely know the areas we need to improve on.”