What a close battle in Bremen's Stadthalle ! With just one night of competition to go, there are two different pairs tied at the top of the ranking, with the same number of points and on the same number of laps. On Monday night session Germany's Andreas Kappes and Andreas Beikirch regained the overall lead by getting 324 points; but that's the same score gotten by Holland's Slippens and Stam, the surprising contenders who regained a lap on their main rivals and are ready for the "final sprint" on Tuesday.

But the overall win won't be a matter of two teams only: Scott McGrory and Matt Gilmore lost the lead, but are just seven points down on the leading pairs, and their chances to take the title for the second time, after their win in 2001, are far from over.

You'd better not write off Italy's Martinello and Villa either, while the situation is not that good for the "Alpen-express": last year's winners Risi and Betschart are currently sitting in fifth place, one lap and more than 100 points down on the leaders, and their overall chances are very slim.

As for Marty Nothstein and Franz Stocher, the Austrian-American duo lost two laps and one place on Monday night, and is now ranked ninth overall.

If there's still one "hot" night to go in the professional race, the "young guns" competition finished on Monday, with the main favourites according to cycling pundits, Germany's Stefan Löffler (20) and Christoph Meschenmooser (19), taking over the lead at the right time and winning the contest as expected. The young Germans were also silver medallist in the Madison race, at the European U23 Championships disputed in Amsterdam three months ago. Former leaders Iljo Keisse and Jon Van den Abeele of Belgium dramatically dropped to third overall in the ultimate night, finishing behind Holland's Gideon Dejong and Geert-Jan Jonkmann too.

Overall Standings after Night 5:

1. Andreas Kappes - Andreas Beikirch (GER) - 324 points

2. Robert Slippens - Danny Stam (HOL) - 324 points

3. Scott McGrory (AUS) - Matthew Gilmore (BEL) - 317 points

4. Silvio Martinello - Marco Villa (ITA) - 281 points

at 1 lap

5. Bruno Risi - Kurt Betschart (SWI) - 217 points

at 2 laps

6. Erik Weißpfennig - Stefan Steinweg (GER) - 229 points

at 7 laps

7. Jimmi Madsen - Michael Sandstödt (DEN) - 141 points

at 8 laps

8. Adriano Baffi (ITA) - Jean Pierre van Zyl (RSA) - 210 points

at 9 laps

9. Marty Nothstein (USA) - Franz Stocher (AUT) - 288 points

10. Lars Teutenberg - Frank Kowatschitsch (GER) - 176 points

at 11 laps

11. Guido Fulst - Andreas Müller (GER) - 90 points

at 12 laps

12. Gerd Dörich - Jens Lehmann (GER) - 121 points

Numbers in brackets refer to the points earned by the pair in each night of competition

1. Meschenmoser-Löffler (GER) - 82 points (14 16 20 18 14)

2. De Jong-Jonkmann (HOL) - 78 points (4 20 16 20 18)

3. Keisse-van den Abele (BEL) - 76 points (20 18 18 14 6)

4. Hester-Morkov (DEN) - 64 points (12 8 12 12 20)

5. Altmann-Frey (GER) - 60 points (16 12 14 6 12)

6. König-Raasch (GER) - 58 points (18 10 6 16 8)

7. Hafemann-Musiol (GER) - 44 points (10 14 8 8 4)

8. Piper-Welsch (GER) - 40 points (6 4 10 4 16)

9. Bommel-Bengsch (GER) - 38 (8 6 4 10 10)

10. Schulz-Papparlado (GER) - 9 points (2 2 2 2 1)

11. Kux-Reich (GER) - 6 points (1 1 1 1 2)

12. Rödel-Martin (GER) - 5 points (1 1 1 1 1)