Tonight the Coventry Bees hosted the Lakeside Hammers in the first meeting of the two sides since the tragic death of Lakeside rider, and former Bee, Lee Richardson.
Following Monday night's defeat which saw Scott Nicholls suffer a broken collarbone in a horrible high speed crash, the Bees dafted in Swindon's Peter Kildemand as a guest, with rider replacement in use for the absent Aaron Summers due to other speedway commitments.
On league form, most would've expected the Hammers to gain an advantage in this first leg and after the first four heats they had edged out a two point lead. However heat 5 saw the Bees draw level and the match turned the way of the Bees as a 4-2 and a 5-1 maximum in heats 8 & 9 moved them 6 points clear.
The Hammers immediately clawed 2 of those points back but successive 5-1 maximums for the Bees in heats 12 & 13 put the match score to 45-33.
The 2012 KO cup ace format now changed from that used in the Elite league with heat 14 being a 2nd reserve race followed by a top scorer race in heat 15. However a team that is 8 or more points behind can declare a match race which is exactly what the Hammers called after heat 13, with Peter Karlsson edging out Chris Harris to peg the Bees lead back by a further 3 points.
A heat 14 4-2 for the Hammers suddenly had the gap down to 7 points, before a final heat 15 maximum from Chris Harris and Kenny Larsson made the final match score 52-41 to the Bees, and a 11 point advantage to take into tomorrow nights 2nd leg at Lakeside.
Tonights scorers for the Bees were: