Crump, new British champion!!

"Jason Crump is back!" was the headline news from the 2008 FIM Meridian Lifts British Grand Prix at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium last night when the two-times World Champion gave Nicki Pedersen a stark warning that this year’s title hunt is not a foregone conclusion. Pedersen, who still leads the championship table by 10 points, endured an amazing night during which he was twice fortunate to benefit from controversial decisions by Polish referee Marek Wojaczek.
Pedersen clearly touched the tapes in an early heat, which should have resulted in a mandatory exclusion but Wojaczek allowed the race to continue and later, after clashing with Leigh Adams on the first corner, it was the Aussie who amazingly was shown the exclusion light.
In the first semi-final Bjarne Pedersen, who led the qualifying scorers with 14 points, clashed with his Danish namesake in identical fashion to Adams and he, too, was excluded, much to the chagrin of the 45,000 crowd. Pedersen was heartedly booed for the remainder of the meeting but pointed out that it was the referee who made the decisions and there have been plenty of occasions in the past when he has been the victim. This was the fifth time this year he has reached the final without going on to win but Crump, after such a slow start to the season, is gaining fast. Great Britain’s Scott Nicholls reached the final for the first time this year only to break the tapes and earn an exclusion which left just Crump, the ever-green Greg Hancock and Nicki Pedersen at the tapes. Pedersen crashed for the fourth time and gamely got to his feet while the race continued with Crump just getting the better of Hancock, as did Chris Harris 12 months before. Track conditions became more and more difficult as the night wore on and the experience of Hancock, racing in his 105th consecutive Grand Prix, and Crump shone through. Though critical of the conditions both were at pains to point out that the FIM British Grand Prix remains the highlight of the year and that competing under the roof at the Millennium Stadium is still a fantastic experience. Crump admitted that things have started to fall into place since the beginning of the month and his domestic form in Poland, Sweden and Britain is now being reflected in his Grand Prix racing. Nicholls can take many positives away from the meeting and at least both he and Harris won heats for the first time this year. Harris, who won here a year ago, had a very heavy fall in his fifth ride but recovered to compete in the rerun and earn a semi-final place but he lost out to Hancock and Crump.
FIM Meridian Lifts British Grand Prix: 1 Jason Crump (Australia) 22, 2 Greg Hancock (USA) 20, 3 Nicki Pedersen (Denmark) 11, 4 Scott Nicholls (Great Britain) 12, 5 Bjarne Pedersen (Denmark) 14, 6 Chris Harris (Great Britain) 10, 7 Hans Andersen (Denmark) 9, 8 Andreas Jonsson(Sweden) 8, 9 Leigh Adams (Australia) 7, 10 Niels Kristian-Iversen(Denmark) 6, 11 Rune Holta (Poland) 6, 12 Tomasz Gollob (Poland) 4, 13 Edward Kennett (Great Britain) 4, 14 Krzysztof Kasprzak (Poland) 4, 15 Fredrick Lindgren (Sweden) 2, 16 Lukas Dryml (Czech Republic) 1.
World Championship Standings after Round 5: N.Pedersen 80, J.Crump 70, G.Hancock 64, T.Gollob 62, L.Adams 49, H.Andersen 48, A.Jonsson 46, F.Lindgren 41, R.Holta 39, S.Nicholls 35, N.K.Iversen 32, C.Harris 30, B.Pedersen 25, K.Kasprzak 21, L.Dryml 16

Final video at http://www.skysports.com/video/0,20285,14549_3752312,00.html