Holland’s Rene Stellingwerf has been confirmed by FIM as the Permanent Wild Card for this year’s FIM Ice Speedway Gladiators World Championship Finals. Stellingwerf narrowly failed to qualify from the recent Challenge meeting in Sweden but merits his nomination through his current fine form in domestic meetings and Swedish League.
He is currently the Netherlands’ number one and will have an extra personal reason for wanting success this year as a tribute to his long term friend and mentor Tjitte Bootsma who died in November last year.
Stellingwerf joins the 7 qualifiers from the Challenge Round and the 7 riders nominated by virtue of their performance in the 2012 competition. At each event there will be a local Wild Card and the 16 riders will compete in a total of 5 rounds, each over two days.
Qualified Riders for the 2013 Final Series
| Riding N° | Name | Country |
| 1 | Daniil Ivanov | Russia |
| 2 | Dmitry Khomitsevitch | Russia |
| 3 | Dmitry Koltakov | Russia |
| 4 | Harald Simon | Austria |
| 5 | Antti Aakko | Finland |
| 6 | Robert Henderson | Sweden |
| 7 | Grzegorz Knapp | Poland |
| 8 | Franz Zorn | Austria |
| 9 | Eduard Krysov | Russia |
| 10 | Vitaly Khomitsevich | Russia |
| 11 | Pavel Chaika | Russia |
| 12 | Günther Bauer | Germany |
| 13 | Stefan Svensson | Sweden |
| 14 | Stefan Pletschacher | Germany |
| 15 | René Stellingwerf | The Netherlands |
| 16 | Event Wild Card | TBA |
| 17 | Track Reserve 1 | TBA |
| 18 | Track Reserve 2 | TBA |
Qualified Substitutes for the series have also been confirmed. The will be used to replace any of the top riders should they withdraw through injury or other reason. Qualified Substitutes are:
| Riding N° | Name | Country |
| 19 | Jan Klatovsky | Czech Republic |
| 20 | Per-Anders Lindström | Sweden |
| 21 | Tomi Tani | Finland |
| 22 | Max Niedermaier | Germany |
| 23 | Antonin Klatovsky | Czech Republic |
| 24 | Fredrik Olsson | Sweden |
The Finals commence in Krasnogorsk, Russia on 2nd and 3rd March and the draw will be made by FIM shortly. Full details will be announced here as soon as they are known.