The Plymouth camp though wouldn’t feel that way – with seven heat wins out of 15, Matt Bates’ side will feel the devil was in the detail of a somewhat harsh 16 points margin of defeat. If Kent are going to be overhauled in their pursuit of the top four (the goal of all sides in the top half of the TPTNL) it is unlikely now to be by the Devon side who have certainly been good value visitors on a hat trick of trips to Central Park.

There were more than enough excellent racing vignettes to keep a large holiday crowd roundly entertained in this fine advert for the sport. Back from Under 21 World Cup duties, Plymouth’s number one Ellis Perks was involved in some memorable scraps – losing out just once in five rides to the hard riding home captain Jack Thomas and ending with two revenge wins over the teenager including a brilliant pass on the very last lap of the meeting.

The best race though arguably had been in the race immediately before – a hugely memorable heat 14 with passes numbering into double figures comprising two races in one: Anders Rowe being passed finally by the fast-improving Richard Andrews (impressing hugely once more as a visiting rider to Central Park – after a stormy start to his evening), whilst his team mate, Jamie Couzins left it very late to snatch the point for third on the line from stand-in reserve Nick Laurence.

There was raw emotion in Thomas’s endeavours – dedicating his riding to his late grandfather who passed away just the day before.

Plymouth will feel their injury jinx has cost them dearly in their visits to Central Park and in their dwindling chances of making the play offs – whereas the jinxed number one race jacket for the homesters was put to one side this time as debutant Paul Hurry fairly successfully played himself into his new role.

Chris Hunt admits after the amazing win at Stoke and this follow-on win, that points away to Buxton on Sunday and then home to Birmingham next Monday would see play off ambitions nearly secured,
“We can’t take anything for granted though but certainly we go to Derbyshire on Sunday aiming to match our four march points haul from Stoke and that may well be enough to clinch it.”

Next Monday is of course Bank Holiday – with the visitors of the twice TPTNL champions from the Second City, the Birmingham Brummies facing up to old rivals Kent at 6.30pm.

Kent SLYDE Kings 53
P Hurry 2 2 3 1′ 8+1
T Hampshire 0 1′ 3 0 4+1
N Stoneman 3 2 3 1′ 1′ 10+2
A Rowe 2′ 1′ 2′ 2 7+3
J Thomas 3 3 3 2 2 13
J Couzins 1 1 F 1′ 3+1
A Spooner 3 1 2′ 2 8+1

Plymouth Devils 37
E Perks 3 3 2 3 3 14
R Terry-Daley 1 0 2 1 1′ 5+1
Rider replacement – Tim Webster
R Andrews X F 1′ 3 3 7+1
H Atkins 2 3 1 2 0 0 8
A Sheppard F 1 0 0 0 1
N Laurence 2, 0 0 0 2

Heat Results
1 Perks, Hurry, Terry-Daley, Hampshire 59.2 (2-4)
2 Spooner, Laurence, Couzins (fell rem.), (fell) 59.4 (6-6)
3 Stoneman, Rowe, Sheppard, Andrews (fell rem. exc. lapped) 61.1 (11-7)
4 Thomas, Atkins, Spooner, Laurence 59.5 (15-9)
5 (rerun) Perks, Stoneman, Rowe, Terry-Daley 58.2 (18-12)
6 Atkins, Hurry, Hampshire, Sheppard (fell rem.) 58.7 (21-15)
7 Thomas, Terry-Daley, Couzins, Andrews (fell) 59.9 (25-17)
8 Hampshire, Spooner, Terry-Daley, Laurence 60.1 (30-18)
9 Stoneman, Rowe, Atkins, Sheppard 59.8 (35-19)
10 Hurry, Atkins, Andrews, Hampshire 59.3 (38-22)
11 Thomas, Perks, Terry-Daley, Couzins (fell) 61.2 (41-25)
12 Andrews, Spooner, Stoneman, Sheppard 61.6 (44-28)
13 Perks, Thomas, Hurry, Atkins 59.2 (47-31)
14 Andrews, Rowe, Couzins, Laurence 60.4 (50-34)
15 Perks, Thomas, Stoneman, Atkins 59.9 (53-37)