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SOUND START: Chris Holder

CHRIS Holder has given the thumbs-up to the start of his Pirates career, but feels he still has a lot more to offer on away tracks.

The 20-year-old Poole Castle Cover star has chalked up impressive scores of 10 and 11 at home against Lakeside and Eastbourne respectively.

He also bagged six at the Arena-Essex Raceway and paid seven at Arlington, both tight circuits that fully test a rider's skill.

Holder, who lines up for the Dorset club at home to Swindon in the Craven Shield tonight (7.30pm), said: "I'm happy with how it is going.

"I have had two good meetings at home and that is good because you have to score points at home.

"The two away meetings have been on tracks that probably aren't my favourite types of track.

"I was pretty disappointed with my display at Eastbourne, although five plus two was okay. I had some clutch problems in my first race and spun around myself in the second and fell.

"When we finally got the clutch working well, I made a good start but Bjarne (Pedersen) and Scott (Nicholls) had already got ahead of me.

"I wish I had started off like I did then from the first race but it will be okay the next time I go to Arlington.

"It was a pretty tight track, but if you can make a start you can do alright."

Holder added: "It was the same deal at Lakeside, I had no problem getting round even though it was my first time there as well.

"There are just a few things I can do a bit better to get round the track."

Holder, who felt the "icy" track conditions on a freezing cold night at Arlington was the main contributing factor to his fall, was delighted with his Wimborne Road performance earlier the same day.

He said: "It was the most comfortable I have had at Poole.

"Now we all need to have good meetings against Swindon tonight."

With race points difference likely to decide the winners of Group A, Poole need to beat Swindon by a big score tonight to give themselves a real chance of progressing in the competition.

Swindon, with ex-Pirates Troy Batchelor and Leigh Adams in their line-up, will be upbeat, though, following their surprise 98-87 aggregate triumph over fancied Coventry in the Elite Shield.

Karol Zabik is expected to return for Poole tonight after missing their 52-42 defeat at Eastbourne with a wrist injury sustained in the home leg.

But Zabik, who had been hoping to test his injured wrist out, was unable to practice at Torun yesterday because the track was unfit.

Pirates: 1 Bjarne Pedersen, 2 Adam Skornicki, 3 Davey Watt, 4 Karol Zabik, 5 Chris Holder, 6 Zbigniew Suchecki, 7 Freddie Eriksson.

Swindon: 1 Leigh Adams, 2 James Wright, 3 Troy Batchelor, 4 Mads Korneliussen, 5 Travis McGowan, 6 Theo Pijper, 7 Sebastian Alden.

7:00am Wednesday 26th March 2008

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