BSB Title race tightens up after dramatic Donington

2023 British Superbike Championship
Round Ten – Donington Park

Images by David Yeomans Photography

Summary

The fight to become the 2023 Bennetts British Superbike Champion intensified at the penultimate round of the season at Donington Park as the BeerMonster Ducati team-mates clashed in the second race, both crashing out of the action.

Three races now remain in the battle to become Bennetts British Superbike Champion at Brands Hatch, with a maximum of 105 points available at the final Showdown.

Eight riders remain within 105 points of Bridewell at the top of the standings, with Irwin still his closest rival. Ryde and Haslam lead the chasing pack, 35 points and a further six points respectively adrift, with Lee Jackson 2.5 points down on Haslam. Meanwhile O’Halloran, Brookes and Iddon remain in mathematical contention.

Superbike Race Two

Kyle Ryde claimed victory in a dramatic second Bennetts British Superbike Championship race at Donington Park, as the BeerMonster Ducati team-mates clashed at Melbourne with Glenn Irwin and Tommy Bridewell crashing out of contention.

The fight for the 2023 title took another turn after an intense seven-way battle for victory. Bridewell had started at the back of the grid in 26th position and had been carving his way through the pack to have closed in on the leading group by lap eight.

Irwin had been at the front of the field after starting 12th on the grid to lead by the second lap ahead of Leon Haslam, Ryan Vickers and Ryde as Bridewell joined the pack.

By lap nine, there was a scramble for the lead as the rain flags were shown and the riders battled to hold the advantage. However, by the end of that lap, Bridewell had carved through to take the lead at Goddards.

Bridewell and Irwin were then scrapping for the lead, with Haslam, Vickers and Ryde also in the mix as the leading title contenders refused to give an inch to their rivals.

By lap 11, Irwin had regained the lead but Bridewell was still pushing to regain the advantage as tensions continued to rise. As the pack reached Melbourne on lap 12, Bridewell tagged the back of Irwin and then pair subsequently crashed out of the race, making it another non-point scoring race for both BeerMonster Ducati riders.

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Ryde held onto the lead from Haslam and Christian Iddon who had joined the fray, as the race was red flagged on lap 17 for rain. The pair now have closed again on their BeerMonster Ducati rivals with the pair still separated by half a point as Ryde in third is now 31.5 points adrift of Irwin with Haslam just a further two points behind.

Lee Jackson continued his consistency with a fourth place for the Cheshire Mouldings Kawasaki team and Jason O’Halloran on the McAMS Yamaha.

Ryan Vickers was sixth ahead of Charlie Nesbitt and Josh Brookes with Max Cook and Peter Hickman completing the top ten.

Superbike Race Two Results

Superbike Race Three

Jason O’Halloran returned to winning ways in the final Bennetts British Superbike Championship race of the weekend at Donington Park as he commanded the conditions to take the victory by 6.936s as Leon Haslam and Glenn Irwin had heartbreak with technical problems that sidelined them from the race.

O’Halloran had a lightning start and broke the pack to take his fifth win of the season for McAMS Yamaha, but behind the podium battle was on and it went down to the finish.

On the opening lap Glenn Irwin suffered a technical problem that saw him instantly sidelined, meaning he leaves Donington Park without scoring a single point, but whilst he was out of the action, his BeerMonster Ducati teammate Tommy Bridewell had an equally tough race in the wet conditions to finish in ninth place. As the championship reaches Brands Hatch for the season finale, the pair are still only separated by 7.5 points.

As the BeerMonster Ducati team endured their most difficult weekend of the season, Haslam looked set to close the deficit to the pair even further and he was running second when he suffered a mechanical issue and was then out of the action on lap 16. With potential of track contamination the race was red flagged and the result declared.

Oxford Products Racing Ducati’s Christian Iddon completed a fantastic weekend for the team by being promoted to second, whilst Josh Brookes claimed the final top three place to return to the podium for the FHO Racing BMW Motorrad Team.

Charlie Nesbitt had another strong performance in fourth place for the MasterMac Honda by Hawk Racing team ahead of Jack Kennedy and Storm Stacey who had a race-long battle for fifth place.

Peter Hickman held off Lee Jackson for eighth place ahead of Bridewell and Davey Todd who claimed his best result for the Milwaukee BMW Motorrad Team. Whilst Kyle Ryde missed out on the top ten in 12th place.

Superbike Race Three Results

Quotes

Jason O’Halloran

“It’s been an amazing day. I was really happy with the first race to come from 21st to fifth but at the same time I was also a little frustrated as the race got stopped early and a podium was on the cards. Starting on the front row for the last race obviously made things a lot easier the bike felt fantastic in the wet conditions. Even when I was pulling away I didn’t feel like I was riding out of my skin to do it, I felt really comfortable on the bike, trying to hit all my markers and control the lap time. I used my dash and my lap timer to break the track into sectors and make sure I wasn’t too far away at any given point and the boys gave me great signals on the board so we could control it to the end. To get another win and bring the gap to the leader down with 35 points per race on offer at Brands certainly means we can head there with a spring in our step.”

Niccolò Canepa

“This weekend has been a fantastic experience, I have really enjoyed the bike, the team and the atmosphere here at BSB. Unfortunately we didn’t achieve what we could have because the conditions were really difficult. I was really satisfied to qualify seventh in the dry and I thought I could have had a strong dry race but unfortunately the conditions changed! In the mixed conditions in the Sprint I had to retire which was a shame as it would have been good to get the experience in the wet with no traction control. In warm up I learned a lot about the wet conditions and felt confident, but then the race was dry! It took me a while to get up to speed in the dry conditions, but when I did I had the pace for the top six/seven so this is promising but it was too late. And then in race three the conditions changed again! It was a similar story, I had pace at the end once I had found my rhythm so while we didn’t achieve a result, we gained a lot of experience so I am ready for Brands Hatch whatever the conditions!”

Glenn Irwin

“This weekend has highlighted the highs and lows of racing, particularly the Glenn Irwinlatter but it’s part of the job and it’s left the championship on a knife edge. I felt good in the first race and was pretty much in cruise mode until the spots of rain began to fall which led me to back off a bit. The incident with Tommy happened but I bear no resentment, we put it behind us and moved on to the last race. I had a good feeling in the wet but, unfortunately, a throttle sensor went so we ended the weekend with no points. The points table could have looked a lot different but I’m only 7.5pts behind Tommy and mentally I feel in a good place and I’m so fortunate to ride for such a good team.”

Tommy Bridewell

“I’m sore after today’s crash and worn out emotionally after the weekend. Without doubt it’s been a tough day and a rollercoaster of a meeting and whilst the incident in the first race was bad for all of us, it was just a racing incident, but I apologised to Glenn and his team as it was obviously disappointing for both of us. I felt so strong on the bike and to come from last on the grid to lead after eight laps is almost unheard of in BSB so it’s a real shame it happened. In the final race, I had a few visibility issues, but I came here half a point behind in the championship standings and I’m leaving 7.5pts in the lead so I’m feeling positive going into the final round at Brands.”

Josh Brookes

“We haven’t been positive all the way through, in fact it’s been quite disappointing. We came here with high hopes and were definitely optimistic after having a strong round earlier in the year, I was on the podium and you expect you’re going to improve the bike and come back to the same track and your results will be better than you were before. Obviously that’s the same for everybody, so everybody improves and it makes that more difficult, but we felt like we should have had a better weekend. From the first practice I was really struggling with corner entry, we tried to improve it but what we didn’t seem to work and I qualified back in 17th. In the wet conditions our pace was strong and in the first race I came through to seventh, which gave me a good grid position for the next race. The small improvements we’d made from qualifying to the second race had improved the bike, and even though it was mostly wet conditions in the races, I managed to hold my place and not drop back too much, so I was in a good position for the final race. It was wet for most of the race and I was battling with other riders, making passes and it was positive you know, I felt like I had the ability to pass others and stretch away, which is as a racer you kind of want that feeling of being able to improve and progress, so to be in that position again this weekend was a great pleasure. We did kind of get gifted a podium position, as much as I was trying to close the gap to Christian [Iddon] it was coming down, but I probably wouldn’t have got to him before the end unless he made a significant mistake, but then Leon [Haslam] ended up going out with a failure and the race got red flag, which gave me the third position. So, yeah obviously I’d rather get third on my own merit, but you know when it’s been this long without a podium myself, the FHO Racing team, all the sponsors and supporters, they need this as much as I do, so I’m really pleased for everybody involved that we’ve been able to get back to the podium and share champagne!”

Peter Hickman

“The weekend was full of potential that never really turned into a result, I guess is probably the best way to describe it. Friday was okay, not brilliant but okay, I ended up 12th overall and we made a few changes ready for Saturday, which seemed to go in the right direction. Qualifying, I did my fastest-ever time at Donington Park GP circuit (1:27.967), which I was quite happy about, the leaders were a bit far away, but I was close to the row so overall qualifying eighth I was quite happy with, especially where we’ve been and I’m not particularly good on one laps anyway. However it kind of went wrong from there, for the first race I gambled on the wet tyre which I think was actually the right decision but we left the hard set up on the bike and it just didn’t seem to work with the tyres. We had too much movement and I had loads of moments, I got into second place early on the first lap and then just really struggled resulting in us finishing ninth. We were then on the back foot going into the next race with the lap time, which put us 18th on the grid. My times in Sunday’s first race weren’t so bad and I was actually half a second faster than the leaders, but being so far back on the grid I can’t easily make passes and by the fourth/fifth lap the best of the tyre is gone, and you’re on the back foot again for the next race. In the final race, we started mid-pack in 15th and with the rain I struggled with the visor steaming up, something I’ve never had before in my entire career, which is really unusual. Not only was it steaming up, the water on the outside it was almost like it was sticking to the visor, which is really odd, so I literally couldn’t see which is not ideal. So getting up to seventh was okay, and I felt like I actually had pace to be on the podium if I hadn’t had visor issue. We’ve never really had a good set-up in the rain for a really long time, but we were pretty strong, which is a positive from the weekend, but again the results are not where we should be.”

British Superbike Championship Points

The final round of the BSB series takes place at Brands Hatch on October 15