The Biker Place

After quite a disappointing weekend for me at Donington Park the previous week with NG Road Racing where I parked my shiny freshly painted bike in the gravel trap at coppice, we had another very busy couple of days (Big thanks to Bryan Halford) to get the bike re built again in time for the trip to Oulton Park for round 6 of the National Superstock 600 Championship.

I was really up for this race as earlier in the year I had to retire from the race here while in a solid top 10 position with an electrical problem. Also now I have two bikes so I felt a lot more relaxed knowing that I could push a lot harder all weekend.

In the Free practice Session I had new brakes to bed in so it was a couple of steady laps then into the pits to let it all cool down. We were running an ld set of tyres so I didn’t want to do anything silly and just used the 25 minute session to familiarise myself with the circuit again.

Although the weather was very dodgy all day it dried in time for our Qualifying 1 Session. I felt happy with the bike I set my quickest lap on lap 6 of the 12 I managed to get in but with over 50 riders all out on circuit trying to get into the top 40 its always a bit hit or miss on whether you can get a clear lap in. I ended the Session 4th and with weather forecasts looking not too good for the following day I was happy with the provisional front row start.

True to its word Saturday Morning came and brought the rain with it. I do enjoy riding in the wet but didn’t want to risk doing anything silly and hurting myself for the race as we raced on the Saturday this weekend instead of Sunday. I went out in the Qualifying 2 Session on my spare/wet bike which I haven’t ridden before but it all felt ok. Set a few quick laps early on and felt happy enough that if the race was wet I could be competitive on it.

I was really looking forward to the race, it was nice to be starting on the front row because at previous rounds I felt that I could challenge at the front but getting through the field was almost impossible. It’s a credit to everybody in the field how close we all are and it makes for great racing though.

The race started and I was greeted at the first corner by a completely sideways Chris Northover, fair play an impressive start and first corner. I don’t know if that shook me up or whether I was thinking don’t be an idiot and bin it on the first lap but I was getting passed by lots of people dropping to 11th at one point on the first lap.

I got my head together gave myself a kick up the backside and got 2 back before the end of the lap. The following lap I got another 3 places back and started to close back on the leading group. By the end of the 4th lap id made up 7 places and was back to 4th.

The race then settled down slightly, the leader crashed out and I found myself in 3rd well for about half a lap as I went very wide into turn 1 allowing Lee Johnston to pass me for 3rd. I kept my head and followed the lead group. They seemed to pull a gap on me in the 1st half of the lap but I was able to close them down quite easily through the 2nd part.

Going into the final lap I was determined to try and make a move. I closed onto the back of the 2 in front of me and was going to make a move inside on the last corner but Luke Stapleford had the same idea so I pulled to the left and managed to cut back inside Lee Johnston and pass him for the final Podium spot over the line.

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