AFTER TUESDAY’S RACING WAS
cancelled due to bad weather, Wednesday did not fall victim to the rain gods and the proceedings continued in brilliant weather. As the race started it became quite clear that Ian Hutchinson would be really hard to beat as the Bingley Bullet took a fabulous lead in the early stages of the race. At Ramsay Hairpin, Hutchy was 1.3 seconds clear of Rutter, who was in second. By the time Hutchinson came around the Grand Stands for the first time, he was already 4.5 seconds ahead of Peter Hickman and his Smiths Racing BMW, who overtook Bathams SMT Racing BMW’s Michael Rutter on the first lap.
As the race progressed, Ian Hutchinson kept on increasing his lead, while Peter Hickman tried to play catch-up with the Bingley Bullet. The real competition, however, was between Michael Rutter and IOM resident Dan Kneen.
On the second lap, Rutter ran into trouble when Kneen managed to overtake him and get into third. The difference was tiny, but as the lap progressed, Kneen went faster, increasing the gap. By the end of lap two, Kneen was already 6.5 seconds clear of Rutter. On lap three, the gap between him and Rutter stayed pretty much unchanged. On the final lap, Kneen did a 130.026 mph (209.257 km/h) lap, taking the final podium place with a margin of 10 seconds.
Hutchy won the Superstock race, taking his TT tally to a superb 16. Peter Hickman ended up on the podium for the third time in 2017. However, it was Dan Kneen who celebrated the most as he bagged his maiden podium in the Superstock race.