Speedway's Bonanza title finally came home last night when Martin Dugard lifted the crown for the first time at the Brighton Centre.

Dugard beat the king of the indoor track, Paul Hurry, American Brent Werner and world champ-ion Mark Loram in a thrilling finale.

It was his first triumph in the event, and no one deserved the accolade more than the man who led Eastbourne Eagles to the Elite League championship earlier in the year.

Dugard, a prime mover in bringing indoor speedway to Brighton, was one of an army of helpers who worked round the clock to instal the track and then take it away again.

And when he wasn't in action riding in front of 5,000 ecstatic fans, he was driving the roller in bet-ween races.

His triumph after a series of near misses in previous years was also a painful experience.

He needed treatment afterwards for a suspected broken toe sustained in a heavy crash with Loram.

When the final was re-run, Dugard got the better of a wheel-to-wheel duel with twice-winner Hurry.

It was a fitting climax to a night of drama which had earlier seen Dugard win all his five races to top the scorechart, and Hurry dig deep to reach the final.

Dugard, in fact, was beaten only once, by Loram, in ten races, in-cluding four during the afternoon best pairs event.

Hurry, on the other hand, dropped points to both Dugard and Loram and was looking down the barrel after being excluded in another race.

With Dugard, Loram and Werner assured of places in the final, heat 18 was the big shoot-out between Hurry, fans favourite Magnus Zetter-strom, America's Shawn Mc-Connell and Pole Slawomir Drabik for the last spot.

The race was started four times, first Hurry and Drabik crashing on the first bend, then Drabik, who was ex-cluded, and Hurry again, before Hurry won superbly from McConnell and Zetter-strom.

Earlier, Werner, who will ride for Eastbourne next year after agreeing a move from Workington, came from third to first in one race.

The quality of the racing underlined the progress the tournament has made since it was first staged in 1997.

It's no longer a novelty event. It's a serious busi-ness these days, and you can sense how much the riders want to win.

In the end, the four best riders on show made it through to the final, and that says a lot.

There were casualties along the way.

Bobby Schwartz suffered a broken hand when he piled into the boards, David Norris and Adam Skornicki didn't make the evening at all after crashing during the pairs.

That event was won by the two oldest riders on view, Schwartz and Mc-Connell, whose combined ages are 85.

They beat youngsters Chris Neath and Andrew Appleton in the final.