The Club started without a club sponsor, having decided to run with several partners. Long standing partners CTA Direct, Blackmoor Service Station and D & M Burgess Joiners, were joined by City Build Manchester as the club’s four partners. Paul & Joanne Whitelegg resigned their Committee posts and were replaced by Catherine White and Tracy Snell.

The year got off to a tremendous start, with a £95,000 grant award from British Cycling’s Facilities Fund to re-build the race track, after eleven years of unsuccessful applications. The superb new facility was built within eight weeks by contractors City Build Manchester and A.A. Fencing, of Liverpool. At the end of the year, club members erected external perimeter fencing.

For the first time since 1994, we didn’t stage a British or International Finals event, due to the reformatting of British Finals weekends. A&T finished runners-up in British Cycling’s national Go-Ride Club of the Year and in the Wigan Sports Club of the Year awards. Mike Hack won three major awards – Cycle Speedway Referee of the Year, Sport Leigh Lifetime achievement, British Cycling Go-Ride Special recognition. We finished the year with 70 cycle speedway riders, 12 ladies road riders, 8 off road riders and 18 officials/ volunteers.

The Northern League Division 1 team was generally made up of juniors and veterans, further disrupted by our worst ever run of injuries. We finished 6th out of 8 teams in the league, 4th out of 6 teams in the Northern Fours League and 3rd out of 3 teams in the Manchester League Division 1. In the Northern League Division 2, we were unbeaten going into September, but three defeats saw us finish 2nd out of 8 teams. Paul Graham stepped down as team manager at the end of the season. The juniors had another excellent season under the guidance of Will Evans.

We again won both the Northern League Division 3 and Manchester League Division 2, finishing 2nd out of 6 teams in the Northern Junior League. A 3rd place finish in the U-10 British Club Championship helped us to a 9th place finish out of 16 clubs in the overall BCC table. Max Evans won the U-14 British Grand Prix series, with John White winning the u-10 British Grand Prix series. Our riders dominated the Northern and Manchester Individual Finals. Przemek Binkowksi was a member of the Poland team which won the European Team Cup Final and Reece Pollitt rode for the winning England team in the European Junior Team Cup. Reece Pollitt was again the club’s top scorer, with 351 points, and topped the race averages, on 3.34.

1st team photo, back row, l-r: Paul Graham, Ciaran Collins, Max Evans, Ron Makin, Lee Phillips. Kneeling, l-r: John White, Matt Snell, Will Evans.