The 1980 Season

The new decade started with much optimism at The Shay. The team from 1979 took on a slightly new look - skipper Ian Cartwright, exciting youngster Kenny Carter, and Norwegian star Tormod Langli were retained, but the Lohmann brothers departed for pastures new - Mike headed across the Pennines to Belle Vue, whilst Klaus joined Sheffield. Popular Aussies Mick McKeon and Merv Janke returned for another season, to give the Dukes a decent looking top five. Pole Piotr Pyszny was lined up to fill a reserve berth, after a spell with Poole the previous year, but would not be available until mid-April. And Craig Pendlebury was signed from neighbours Sheffield, in the deal which took Klaus Lohmann to Owlerton, to give the Dukes a solid look. In the absence of Pyszny, the Dukes used local reserves Ian Westwell and Alan Stansfield, and later Les Sawyer, and the team started the season well. After a 7 point loss at Belle Vue, the Dukes won their remaining 5 fixtures in the Northern Trophy to take the cup, added to a convincing 10 point home win against Birmingham in the first league fixture.

The promising start was undermined however on Easter Monday in an off-track incident which was to have repercussions for the remainder of the year. Langli suffered a badly broken arm after crashing whilst hang-gliding on the Pennines hours before he was due to ride against Belle Vue that night. The Dukes used rider replacement to cover his absence - and won the match - but as the weeks wore on, the strain on the remaining riders of covering Langli started to show. And as the weeks and months of the season progressed, there seemed little sign of Langli returning.

A heavy defeat at Ipswich, where 4 riders of the remaining 6 contributed a mere 5 points, and another defeat at King's Lynn sounded warning signs that the season was going to be a struggle. Carter was scoring strongly, but when Coventry visited the Shay on 3rd May, Carter ended up in the fence, victim of a harsh exclusion which many felt was the fault of Tommy Knudsen. Already using rider replacement for Langli, the team slipped to a first home defeat.

At the bottom end of the team, the Dukes signed another Norwegian - Jorn Haugvaldstad - but the experiment lasted just 5 matches, and after he failed to score a single point, he was released.

Carter missed the away fixture at Wimbledon, and Pyszny failed to show - and the Dukes lost heavily on their travels again.

Reading - ultimately to be crowned league champions - were Halifax's opponents in the Knock-out cup - and despite a brave showing in the first leg at Smallmead, losing by 16 points, the deficit was too much to make up in the return. The away result was not helped by a poor return from Carter, netting just 4 points from 5 starts. In the return leg, he hit a 15 point maximum, and with Cartwright also adding 14, the Dukes won the match, but lost on aggregate.

Home league form improved through the spring and into the summer - the Dukes did not lose again at home until August, when title-chasing Hackney stunned the Dukes, coming from 15 points behind after 8 races to win by a point in the final heat. The problem was the away form - apart from wins at Hull in May, and Sheffield in September, Halifax were beaten in every away fixture - several times heavily. Although Carter regularly hit big scores (19 double figure scores) support was often sporadic - if one rider had a good day, others didn't. In all league outings, McKeon, Janke and Pendlebury only hit double figures between them on 5 occasions - and a constant revolving door at reserve, with Les Sawyer and Pyszny missing several matches at different times clearly didn't give much to the bottom end scoring.

In the end, the Dukes managed a reasonably creditable 10th place finish, but down 4 places from 1979. They managed to win 13 of their 16 home league fixtures, but lost 14 of the 16 away ties.

One minor success was in the Inter-League 4-Team tournament. Grouped with Hull, Sheffield and National League Berwick, the Dukes were good value for their 2nd place, qualifying for finals day at Wolverhampton along with Hull. In the Semi Final, they eliminated Hull and Eastbourne to reach the final 4. However, Cartwright was injured in a collision with Kudrna of Birmingham, and was unable to ride in the final. As a result, the Dukes finished a distant last behind Cradley Heath, King's Lynn and Birmingham.

The absence of Langli clearly put a strain on several riders through the season - whilst it gave opportunities for extra rides, the physical toll on man and machine definitely wore some riders down as his continued absence dragged on. And the problem was compounded at the end of the season when Langli - absent all year - demanded a transfer away from the Shay. In 2 seasons, the Norwegian competed in only a handful of meetings, and subsequently never rode in the UK again.

Carter's form was a revelation - despite a couple of crashes and a few mechanical set-backs, he averaged 9 points a meeting, took the individual honours in the 3 individual meetings held at The Shay, and was unlucky to not be on the rostrum at the BLRC at Belle Vue. Cartwright was still a solid performer, although his average dipped by a point from 1979. Janke, McKeon and Pyszny all showed promise which would make the Dukes more solid in 1981...however as the year ended, all 3 threw the Dukes' plans into confusion. Both Janke and McKeon announced they would not be returning to the UK for 1981, and the continuing issues with Polish contracted riders (and a sub 6-point average) presumably scuppered any chance of Pyszny returning.

The Dukes needed some reconstruction as they headed into 1981...

The heat details, scorers and reports for each meeting through the season can be found by clicking on the pages for each month.