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31st August 2010
British
Superbike racer Tom Tunstall suffered mechanical woes and a lack of
track time but still bounced back to score points as well as making
great progress at the latest round over the weekend.
Cadwell Park was the stage, as the British Superbike Championships visited the Lincolnshire circuit for the second time in 2010.
Preparations
for Tom and his Doodson Motorsport Team had initially gone well during
the first free practice session however a broken crankshaft on Sunday
morning cast a long shadow, as Tunstall explained;
“I don’t think we’ve had a straight forward weekend this season!
“Obviously
to lose our best engine was disappointing but the team did a great job
to even get me out for qualifying. Unfortunately the gear lever then
came off and I ended up with only six or seven minutes to get dialled
in and get a time which wasn’t ideal, I didn’t really click and that’s
why we’ve ended up back in 23rd on the grid.”
The
first of the two Bank Holiday Monday races saw Tunstall get away well,
making up places from the first lap. Lapping faster than he’d ever done
around the tight and undulating 2.18mile track he passed Aprilia
mounted Chris Burns on lap 11 and from then had a fairly lonely race.
Benefitting from the last corner fracas between John Laverty and Tommy
Bridewell, Tunstall was classified as 15th and the final points scorer.
Race
two saw the Doodson Motorsport rider set an even faster pace. From the
fourth lap he was under his previous best lap time and continued to
improve lap by lap until the race was prematurely ended on lap 13 when
James Edmeandes fell heavily from his KTM.
“I’ve got mixed feelings once again...
“Considering
the issues we’ve had I’m happy how the team and I turned things around.
We were suffering from a lack of track time today, you could see that
from the lap times as literally lap by lap I was getting quicker.
“At
this level you can’t give anyone a head start but through little fault
of our own that’s what happened this weekend. But like other times this
year when we’ve had issues it just deepens our resolve to come back
stronger and get the chance to show what we can do.”
The
next opportunity for Tom and the Doodson Motorsport team comes in just
under two weeks time when the British Superbike Championships visit the
teams home county of Yorkshire with Croft hosting the next round on the
weekend of the 10th-12th September...
photo courtesy of motoprofessional.com
photo courtesy of motoprofessional.com
photo courtesy of motoprofessional.com
