Great Britain youth boss Neil Vatcher was delighted with his team’s bronze medal in the FIM World Team Under-21 Championship final.
The hugely-inexperienced squad racked up 32 points at Outrup, Denmark on Saturday night in difficult conditions.
After a sluggish start, Poland came from seven points down to reel in the hosts to win their seventh successive title.
But Vatcher was satisfied with his young side’s efforts on a challenging day. He said: “It was always going to be very difficult against the strong Poles and Denmark on their home track. That’s how it turned out.
“However, we must appreciate just how inexperienced our team are. They dug in and competed right the way through this meeting.
“It was tough for them. Only Dan Bewley had done laps around this track prior to tonight. Then practice was called off and that meant just a couple of laps being going into the meeting.
“Not only that but the track conditions were very difficult. The second bend was especially tricky and all the riders found it hard. The weather didn’t help and I must say the track staff at Outrup worked hard to get it right.
“But overall we are very pleased to get this result. We are making progress and it will take time but it’s our third successive medal in this event and that’s excellent.”
Bewley led the charge for Great Britain with a wonderful 17-point haul including a crucial double points joker race win.
Tom Brennan also continued his progress with seven points and that was despite a frustrating retirement while in second place in one outing.
Scorers:
Poland 46: Dominik Kubera 14, Wiktor Lampart 13, Jakub Miskowiak 10, Viktor Trofimov 9, Norbert Krakowiak 0.
Denmark 42: Tim Sorensen 13, Mads Hansen 10, Jonas Seifert-Salk 10, Matias Nielsen 5, Marcus Birkemose 4.
Great Britain 32: Dan Bewley 17, Tom Brennan 7, Drew Kemp 5, Jordan Palin 2, Leon Flint 1.
Latvia 6: Francis Gusts 3, Ricards Ansviesulis 2, Ernests Matjusonoks 1, Oleg Michailov 0, Daniils Kolodinskis 0.
Pictures: TAYLOR LANNING