Cornishman Chris Harris, bidding for a successive hat-trick of New Year Classic victories, will have an additional incentive at Sunday's meeting (tapes-up 1.0pm)

Tim Stone, Newport promoter, is offering Harris a "bonus" if he makes it three in a row.

Stone said: "If he wins I have promised him a bonus but obviously there will be riders out to stop him." And if Coventry rider Harris makes it three in a row it will be quite an achievement because he's put together a 'Heinz' machine for the meeting.

It's not exactly 57 different varieties but he's rescued an old grass-track engine and made-up a bike for the meeting, forced into drastic action after sending his top machinery back to Denmark for a winter overhaul.

Harris will face stiff competition with the first-time inclusion of Premier League riders' champion Sean Wilson who has parted company with Sheffield and looking for a new club and former Wasp Niels-Kristian Iversen, who has linked with Elite League club Peterborough from Oxford.

Although Wilson is without a club he will stage his 20-year celebration meeting at Sheffield in March. Stone added: "Within a couple of hours of stepping off the plane from a winter break Sean agreed to ride but as for picking a winner from such a field.....I can't.

"We would have had Stuart Robson and David Howe in the line-up but they are injured. Even without them it is still a hell of a magnificent field."

Wilson said: "I'm really looking forward to it as I've never done this meeting before and I'd like to thank Tim Stone for allowing us to have a merchandise stall there."

And Wilson's former Sheffield teammate Richard Hall, who has joined Elite League Peterborough, will also be on parade for the first time.

l Chris Neath, former Newport rider and Wolver-hampton asset, who lines-up in the New Year Classic, will once again ride for Rye House, the Premier League champions.

l American Brent Werner, a teammate of Neath's at Rye House, is returning to the Elite League with Eastbourne - five years on from his last season with the club.

l The new year bonanza will also include Conference League racing with the Mavericks' riders in action as well as quad bikes which proved popular attractions at a couple of meetings last year.

l Plymouth have been given the green light this week by the city council and promoter Mike Bowden, a former rider, will run a Conference League outfit this summer. It will be the first time speedway has run in the city since 1970.