Great Britain skipper Robert Lambert can’t wait to bring the PGE Ekstraliga trophy back to Torun after his side overcame a high-pressure play-off final to win the club’s first league title since 2008.
Lublin triumphed 52-38 in Sunday’s second leg, but a 54-36 first-leg win for Torun at the Marian Rose Motoarena last Sunday earned them a 92-88 aggregate victory in an epic final showdown.
Torun-based Lambert now heads back to his adopted city for FIM Speedway of Nations Semi-Final 1 on Tuesday, which sees the Lions take on Sweden, Germany, Latvia, Italy, Slovenia and Norway.
And he can’t wait to be reunited with the locals after scoring six points to help Torun end their 17-year search for Polish championship gold.
He said: “We are super happy about getting this gold after so long. It’s going to be an amazing feeling to bring the trophy and gold medal back to Torun. Everyone we speak to is going to be over the moon and happy.
“That was a big pressure meeting, but I handled that well. I was making good starts, and I just started struggling a bit with speed. It’s okay, though – we got the gold medal, and it was enough.
“We needed 37 points, and we got 38, so it was job done. We did everything in our home meeting and that was so important.
“We were thinking a lot, and we were racing very hard too. We gave them a good battle, and it was important to try and limit Lublin’s lead on the night. They could have pulled away quite easily early on. But we wanted it more and that was an important factor.
“I am looking forward to a big week of SON now and I can’t wait to get it underway on Tuesday.”
New European champion Patryk Dudek was Torun’s top performer on 12 paid 14 points, with Danish star Mikkel Michelsen tallying 10 and Emil Sayfutdinov adding eight points.
Six-time Speedway GP world champion Bartosz Zmarzlik raced to 12 paid 13 points for Lublin, with SGP duo Fredrik Lindgren and Jack Holder adding eight paid nine apiece.
For full details of the result and scorers, CLICK HERE.