Swindon’s late fightback proved just in vain as Belle Vue held on for a 46-44 away win at the Abbey Stadium on Thursday.
Trailing by twelve points with three heats to go after a succession of setbacks, the Carpets4Less Robins reduced the gap to two at the end, but it was the Aces who took the overall spoils.
Fast gating in the early stages took the visitors to a series of race wins, and it took until Heat 5 for the lively David Bellego to get the home side on the board.
Bellego surged around Steve Worrall to take the flag, but the former Robins reserve had already done plenty of damage by defeating skipper Jason Doyle in Heat 1, and Alun Rossiter’s side suffered a further setback in Heat 3 when Adam Ellis fell heavily on the back straight after the race had already been stopped.
Doyle and Bradley Wilson-Dean collected Swindon’s first advantage with a 4-2 in Heat 6, but the meeting began to slip away with back-to-back 4-2s to the Aces in Heats 9 and 10.
The first saw Craig Cook race to his second win of the night as Dan Bewley collected a vital third place ahead of Ellis, whilst the latter saw Kenneth Bjerre hug the kerb to move inside Doyle midway through the race after Wilson-Dean had tumbled out.
Then Ellis crashed out of second place in Heat 12, elevating Bewley to second place behind Bjerre to leave the Robins needing an unlikely three 5-1s to draw.
Doyle and a very impressive Nick Morris supplied two of them in Heats 13 and 15, but ex-Robin Justin Sedgmen split the home duo in Heat 14, Emil Grondal racing through the pain barrier for third place after bizarrely coming to grief before the start of the race.
Swindon boss Alun Rossiter said: “We lost, which is a negative, but all in all the team did chip in and we have to take the positives against a very strong side.
“Although I’m certainly not putting the blame on him it’s Adam scoring no points that’s cost us. He’s just had one of those nights to forget and he’ll be beating himself up about it.
“He just caught some grip and shut off, and as he shut off the bike came up. Then he swapped the bikes over, the other bike wasn’t quite good enough, and then he went back to the other one which we found was all twisted, which is why he fell in the last one. He isn’t going to score nought every week, so he has to put it behind him.
“I was pleased with David, obviously there was a bit of pressure there with him and Justin on the same sort of average, but he’s a rider that I really like, and he’s fired up to do well for us.”
Robins turn their attention to the Knockout Cup this weekend as they head to Rye House on Saturday before hosting the Rockets in the second leg next Thursday.
SWINDON 44: Nick Morris 13+1, Jason Doyle 12+1, David Bellego 9, Zach Wajtknecht 4+3, Bradley Wilson-Dean 3, Emil Grondal 3, Adam Ellis 0.
BELLE VUE 46: Kenneth Bjerre 10+2, Steve Worrall 9+1, Craig Cook 9, Justin Sedgmen 8, Max Fricke 4+1, Dan Bewley 3+1, Jack Smith 3.
