"Pressure on Doyle" – Hancock

Triple world champion Greg Hancock insisted “the pressure has shifted to Jason” Doyle as he bids to regain the FIM Speedway World Championship lead at the FST Grupa Brokerska Torun SGP of Poland on Saturday.

The Californian was knocked off the SGP summit by the Australian in Stockholm last Saturday as Doyle delivered his third straight SGP win – his fourth of 2016.

No rider who has won four or more SGP rounds in one year has failed to win the World Championship, but Doyle holds just a five-point lead over Hancock with two rounds to race.

Having gone from being the hunted to the hunter, Grin believes the pressure is on the Swindon, Rospiggarna and Zielona Gora man.

He said: “In some ways the pressure is off me now. When you’re at the top everyone is looking at you and the pressure is there a bit more.

“But in second you’re the guy chasing and you’ve got nothing to lose. I’ve been at the top for a while this year but now I’m in second and the pressure has shifted to Jason (Doyle).

“Doyley is the favourite now for sure. He’s the guy with the points in the bag and he’s on an awesome run, so he’s the guy to beat. I take my hat off to him because I know that winning one GP is hard enough – so winning three in a row is a special achievement.”

Hancock has far from given up on title No.4 and hopes to take advantage of his home-track knowledge in Torun, where he races his Polish Ekstraliga home meetings.

He said: “I am still going to fight for every point and fight for that world title; we’ve got two huge rounds left and a lot of racing to do.

“The next round is at Torun which has been my home track in the Polish league all year and that could be a benefit for me.

“I’ve never really had a home track on the GP circuit so I’m hoping that I can use some of the things we’ve learned this year to make it happen and get those points back.”

Doyle went into the season targeting a top-eight finish. This was sealed in Stockholm, and now he’s ready for the challenge of attempting to seal a world title in Torun and at the season-closing QBE Insurance Australian SGP in Melbourne on October 22.

He said: “We know what’s going to happen in the next two rounds. It’s going to be very difficult. If we can go and make a final in the next couple, we’ll be up there in the end.

“Stockholm sealed the deal that I’ll be in the GPs next year, which is a massive achievement that I set out to do at the start of the season. We can park that one and go for something in the future now.”

Third-placed Tai Woffinden has far from given up on his ambitions of retaining the World Championship, despite trailing Doyle by 16.

He said: “Doyley and Greg are going well, but you only have to look at what happened in Stockholm and the massive swing in points for Doyley. If I can achieve something like that, I’m still in it.

“I won’t give up on my hopes until it’s mathematically impossible. If I have a big round in Torun and score more points than the guys above me, it’s going to make it interesting going to Melbourne!

“I like Torun. I’ve had some good GPs there and I’ve also had some good league meetings there, so hopefully I can do well on Saturday.”

Poland’s Bartosz Zmarzlik is his country’s best medal hope. He’s just seven points behind Woffinden and firmly in the battle for bronze.

He could seal his place in the top eight in Torun and hopes the Polish fans will get behind him in his quest for qualification, and maybe more.

He said: “My dream this year is the top eight. I scored 12 points in Stockholm and that is not a bad result. We will see what the result in Torun is.

“I think Torun is a good track for me. The Polish fans are the best people in the world. I hope everything will be good. We’ll see what happens in Torun and Melbourne. Cross your fingers for me.”

FST GRUPA BROKERSKA TORUN SGP OF POLAND LINE-UP (in ranking order with rider numbers): 108 Tai Woffinden (Great Britain), 45 Greg Hancock (USA), 52 Michael Jepsen Jensen (Denmark – substitute for 3 Nicki Pedersen), 88 Niels-Kristian Iversen (Denmark), 69 Jason Doyle (Australia), 55 Matej Zagar (Slovenia), 71 Maciej Janowski (Poland), 23 Chris Holder (Australia), 25 Peter Kildemand (Denmark), 100 Andreas Jonsson (Sweden), 37 Chris Harris (Great Britain), 66 Fredrik Lindgren (Sweden – substitute for 33 Jaroslaw Hampel), 95 Bartosz Zmarzlik (Poland), 777 Piotr Pawlicki (Poland), 85 Antonio Lindback (Sweden), 16 Pawel Przedpelski (Poland – wild card), 17 Kacper Woryna (Poland – track reserve), 18 Oskar Bober (Poland – track reserve).

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS: 1 Jason Doyle 123, 2 Greg Hancock 118, 3 Tai Woffinden 107, 4 Bartosz Zmarzlik 100, 5 Chris Holder 98, 6 Piotr Pawlicki 81, 7 Maciej Janowski 80, 8 Antonio Lindback 74, 9 Fredrik Lindgren 73, 10 Niels-Kristian Iversen 64, 11 Matej Zagar 64, 12 Nicki Pedersen 62, 13 Peter Kildemand 62, 14 Andreas Jonsson 39, 15 Chris Harris 33, 16 Michael Jepsen Jensen 11, 17 Patryk Dudek 8, 18 Martin Smolinski 8, 19 Danny King 7, 20 Krzysztof Kasprzak 7, 21 Anders Thomsen 5, 22 Kim Nilsson 5, 23 Peter Ljung 4, 24 Vaclav Milik 3, 25 Tobias Kroner 2, 26 Denis Stojs 1, 27 Jacob Thorssell 1, 28 Nick Skorja 1, 29 Daniel Kaczmarek 1.