The Dukes in the World Championship 1975

There were major changes to the qualifying format from the start of the 1975 season.  For the first time, Australian and New Zealand riders would not be allowed to participate in the later stages of the British rounds, meaning that the British Final was actually the British Final.  Four Australian and New Zealand riders were nominated to the new Intercontinental Final, where they would compete with the Nordic riders and a lone American to qualify for the European final, where they would meet the top Continental riders, and 12 places up for grabs in the Wembley Final.  Controversially, that left only 4 places for the British riders, with the top four from the British Final at Coventry going on to Wembley.  Eight Dukes set off on their long journey to the Twin Towers, with, for the first time, no Eric Boocock to take Halifax deep into the later rounds.  Their various exploits are detailed as follows:

Dave Gatenby:  The Dukes' number 8 had to negotiate one of the 4 preliminary rounds to make any progress - drawn at Bradford, however, he could only score 8 points, and was eliminated.

Ian Cartwright:  Like Gatenby, Cartwright had to enter via the preliminary rounds, and made the long trip to Weymouth, where he scored 13 points to finish 3rd and qualify for the main draw.  A creditable 7 points in his home round at the Shay was negated by a disastrous round at Hull, where he blew his bike on the way to the start in his first race, and could not continue.  His 6 points at Sheffield were not enough to make the last 32, and his challenge ended there.

Rick France:  The Dukes' skipper's challenge was dented by a heavy crash in his first round at Wolverhampton, which left him on 8 points.  In pain from an injured shoulder, he managed 9 points in the Shay round, but went out of the race after a mere 4 points at Ipswich.

Mike Hiftle:  Scored 5 points from both rounds at Newport and Halifax, but with no chance of progressing, opted to not travel all the way to Poole for his final round.

Graham Plant:  Looked set to do well after 9 points at Halifax, but then had a night to forget at Oxford, where he only managed 4 points.  His third round at Hackney was delayed, after the original staging was washed out, and he failed to make the trip for the re-staging due to illness.

Charlie Monk:  Did enough to qualify for the semi finals, after scores of 8 points at Newport, 13 points at Halifax and 11 at Sheffield.  However, due to the new rule regarding Commonwealth riders, Monk was inelligible to take any further part in the UK rounds, and having not been seeded through to the Intercontinental Final in Sweden, his challenge was over.

Henny Kroeze:  Successfully negotiated qualifying rounds in Italy and  West Germany during May to make it to the Continental Semi-Finals.  But Kroeze missed out on a place in the Final, scoring 8 points (10th) at Olching, West Germany - one more point would have seen him through.

Chris Pusey:  The new Dukes signing rode the tightrope in his qualification rounds - 14 points at Halifax, followed by 12 points at Exeter looked to have set him up nicely - but in the re-arranged Hackney round, Pusey added 2 points before crashing out in his second ride, suffering a badly cut foot.  His total of 28 points just got him into the semi-finals, and drawn at Sheffield, he scraped into the British Final, needing a last race win to get him into a 3-man run-off for the final 2 places, in which he finished second, ahead of Nigel Boocock.  The British Final at Coventry offered a meagre 4 places for the Wembley World Final, and Pusey fell agonisingly short.  Needing a win in his final race to earn a run-off for the final place at Wembley, Pusey could not find a way past former Aces team-mate Collins, and ended up in 6th place on 10 points.

The Wembley final was won by Denmark's Ole Olsen, who regained his title from four years earlier with a 15 point maximum.  Outgoing champion Anders Michanek finished 2 points behind, with England's John Louis defeating Ivan Mauger in a run-off for third place.