"I couldn't race on that" - Billy Hamill.

Team Roberts speedway rider Billy Hamill admitted he only had himself to blame for his opening GP disappointment in Berlin - but then took a swipe at track conditions.

Hamill finished well down the rankings in the Friedrich Ludwig Jahn Stadium in Berlin with just five-points in a meeting won by Poland's Tomasz Gollob. The meeting was delayed by an hour due to heavy rain leaving tricky conditions for the riders.

Hamill performed a miracle in his opening ride when he was sent towards the fence and he kept control of the bike to resemble a "wall of death" ride around the airfence. Only his skill and experience kept him on the bike.

"There's no excuse for my finishing position, I'm the one to blame for that," admitted the American. "But as a rider you leave it to the organisers to provide a racetrack and they were way short of that. This format stinks. If you have a poor gate position you are stuck with it, for example, I was off the inside gate twice, made two poor starts and even though I tried everything I just seemed to be going backwards. I'm obviously disappointed but deep down you don't really want to know exactly how I feel about this.

"Everything combined to provide poor conditions. The shape of the track meant it wasn't a racetrack and the weather didn't help. There were times when I would have been better off just cruising around with the position I had, but that's not me, I'm a natural racer, but I couldn't race on that."