Robert Lambert has won the 2026 FIM Speedway Grand Prix world championship after taking victory in the season-ending meeting in Toruń, Poland, on 26 September.
The 28-year-old Briton finished the campaign on 162 points, two clear of Poland’s Bartosz Zmarzlik, the defending champion. Australia’s Brady Kurtz took third overall with 157 points as a three-rider contest for the title went to the final race of the season.
Lambert’s result made him the ninth British individual speedway world champion and the first since Tai Woffinden won his third title in 2018. British Speedway said the victory ended Zmarzlik’s run of four successive world titles.
A final race decided the championship
Zmarzlik had arrived in Toruń leading Lambert by two points, with Kurtz five points behind the Pole, according to Ekstraliga.pl. The final round therefore offered Lambert a chance to overturn the deficit, but he needed to do so under pressure from both of his championship rivals.
Lambert and Patryk Dudek qualified directly for the final after each scored 12 points in the meeting’s main phase. Zmarzlik and Kurtz then won their respective last-chance races to join them, ensuring that the championship would be determined by a four-rider final also featuring Dudek.
Lambert made the start and retained first place to the finish. Kurtz came home second, while Zmarzlik finished third; that finishing order gave Lambert the points required to claim the championship by two.
Ekstraliga.pl reported that Lambert had lost only to Zmarzlik in his opening ride before winning all of his remaining races in Toruń. The report said his season had begun less strongly, but that he had progressively reduced the gap during the later rounds.
Late-season consistency changes the picture
British Speedway said Lambert’s second-half form had been central to the title success. He won three Grands Prix and recorded three runner-up finishes across his final six rounds, a sequence that put him in position to challenge Zmarzlik at the decisive event.
The Toruń win was Lambert’s third Grand Prix victory of the season after previous successes in Łódź and Vojens, Ekstraliga.pl reported. His ability to convert that late consistency into victory in the meeting’s final race proved particularly significant given the narrow final standings.
Lambert said he had not expected or mapped out the surge he produced in the second half of the campaign. He said the run had developed naturally, while also recognising the work required to reach that level.
He also said he was pleased with the composure he showed when the title came down to the final, explaining that he had focused on taking the meeting race by race and controlling his emotions. Lambert described Toruń as his home stadium, while acknowledging that he had previously endured difficult Grands Prix and bad luck at the venue. He said consistency there had been important after those earlier experiences.
King’s Lynn link remains part of Lambert’s story
The world title will carry particular resonance for King’s Lynn, Lambert’s first British club. The BBC reported that he began riding for King’s Lynn Young Stars in 2013 before joining the senior King’s Lynn Stars side the following year. He later returned for a brief spell in 2023.
King’s Lynn Stars said their former rider had achieved his ambition, while British Speedway noted that the club was where Lambert spent most of his time racing in the UK. The Norwich-born rider’s championship therefore combines a decisive international result with a clear link to the British development route that began in Norfolk.
For Lambert, the defining competitive detail was the final itself: with Zmarzlik, Kurtz and Dudek alongside him, he won the race that settled the 2026 championship.