JASON DOYLE believes Ipswich “need to push on” after signing on for the 2025 season.
The former World Champion is the latest Witches start to be announced for the next campaign at Foxhall Heath.
Doyle, 39, missed half of last season after sustaining a serious shoulder injury in a horror crash at King’s Lynn. But he’s now raring to go again.
He said: “It was a pretty simple decision; obviously other clubs speak to you, but I don’t want to leave any stone unturned.
“After two and a half years, I classify last year as a half-term with the club, we need to push on. The team that we have got for next year, I feel like we have got a chance to finally get that league trophy.”
Doyle had his 2024 season cut short in May after suffering two snapped tendons in his shoulder, a torn rotator cuff, four broken ribs and a lung contusion following the crash at King’s Lynn but is back to full fitness ahead of the new campaign.
He added: “I have been quite lucky with the team I have been working with in England. I had the operation in the middle of June, and it has been a rollercoaster to get back to full fitness.
“As many people know with shoulder injuries, one minute you are OK and the next you are back to square one. At the moment it is really good, and I feel back to 100 per cent.
“I wasn’t ready a month ago, but I am now, it is good that I didn’t rush anything and did everything the right way, the way the doctors said.
“If it was a broken bone, I would have been back pretty much straight away but when you know you are going to be unsafe on the bike, you need to do the right thing and make sure everything is 100 per cent. I have got a few more years left to push for that top spot and a lot more racing to do with Ipswich.
“Normally I crash at the end of the season, so I get the four or five months off!
“It was nice to experience the family side with my baby girl Grace which I haven’t done in so many years. I got to do a lot of things outside of speedway, go on holidays to Spain a couple of times and relax a bit as I tried to get back to 100 per cent. At the moment I am lucky to have the right people around me and feel like it is all getting better.”
The 2017 world champion has been given a wild card for the 2025 Speedway Grand Prix series but admits he was worried about his place for next year.
He continued: “It was nerve wracking watching the GP qualifier and seeing there were already three Aussies going into the Grand Prix.
“I’m lucky I won the Warsaw Grand Prix and was up there in the top three in the world before I got injured. I showed a lot of pace and drive to be World No.1 again.
“There were a few things I needed to make sure were right before going back in the Grand Prix again, but I am ready to go.”
Doyle is heading back to Australia this winter but won’t be riding Down Under.
He concluded: “I am going back for four weeks before coming back. I am not going to race anymore; I was going to go over and do a couple of meetings, but the meetings got cancelled.
“I was only going to go out for the meetings in Mildura and Adelaide. It is a lot of hassle to bring bikes and equipment back for two meetings and the cost is expensive with the changing of flights and stuff. So, I will just come back here and get ready for the new year and by February I will be back on a bike again.”
Words by Holeshot Media.
Images by Taylor Lanning.