KING’S Lynn’s riders are all set to step up their pre-season preparations next week.

The MacInnes Stars will be at the Adrian Flux Arena for press and practice day on Tuesday, as part of a full schedule of on and off-track activity.

In addition to the public practice session at 7.30pm the riders will have further track time available later in the week, and more team building events are planned.

It’s all been designed to ensure the Stars are in the best possible shape for the season ahead, which gets underway on March 30 when they entertain holders Sheffield in the first round of the KO Cup.

The Premiership league programme opens on April 3 when they make the trip to Wolverhampton, who are also the Stars’ first home opponents in the league on April 13.

And team manager Alex Brady feels the team blend this year gives them a real opportunity to work their way back into the play-off mix, having been on the outside looking in for the last three seasons.

Brady said: “What we wanted to do was to build a team of seven riders who go very well around King’s Lynn.

“That’s a big reason for bringing in Michael Palm Toft for instance, because he’s a No.1 around King’s Lynn.

“There aren’t many people who beat him around here, and we saw that when he came with Peterborough last year before his injury.

“We’ve got to win at home, and if you look at the league table from last year that was our downfall. We lost too many matches at home.

“Belle Vue won every meeting at home and barely picked a point up away, and they went on to win the league. They got themselves into the play-offs and anything is possible from there.

“If we’d have won the three matches we lost at home, we would have made the play-offs, and that’s the big thing we identified.

“Krzysztof (Kasprzak) has a good eye for this place as well, along with the five riders we’ve retained, so I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do on a regular basis at home.

“The plan is to win every match here, pick something up away and get those aggregate bonus points, and get in the top four!”

The Stars riders will be fulfilling media commitments at the Adrian Flux Arena on Tuesday afternoon, and supporters are welcome to attend the evening practice.