Superstock success for wheelie good Stamper
IT WAS another successful weekend for Barwell’s Dan Stamper in the Pirelli National Superstock 600 championship.
After finishing third at the previous round of the British Superbikes, Stamper and his team headed to Brands Hatch GP circuit in Kent in high spirits.
The weekend started well, with Dan finishing fourth fastest in practice.
Stamper’s first qualifying session saw him third fastest, provisionally putting him on the front row of the grid for Sunday’s race.
With a few tweaks to his Yamaha, second qualifying proved even more successful, moving him up to second - a prominent position to be starting the feature race from.
With his best qualifying position to date, Stamper was excited and focused for Sunday’s feature race.
Getting a great start off the line, he was leading the pack coming into the first corner.
While usually a great position to be in, leading the race into the first corner on this occasion proved to be a disadvantage for Stamper, as another competitor missed his breaking point, slamming into the side of his machine.
Wrestling a sliding motorbike at 80mph plus, he managed to regain control of the bike, to rejoin the race in sixth place.
He soon moved forward, and by the end of lap two was side by side with the third place rider. Unfortunately for Stamper, fighting for third position allowed the rider in fifth to catch them up, and the following seven laps saw an epic battle for fourth position.
Sat in fifth place on lap 10 and putting in his fastest lap times of the race, Stamper was frustrated to see the red flag held out, meaning another rider had gone down and caused a hazard on the track – cutting the race short and leaving him with a fifth place finish.
Stamper said: “I was gutted the race finished four laps early.
“I was finally into my rhythm after a chaotic race, and was confident I had a podium finish in sight.
“Still, fifth is a strong finish, and I have shown all weekend that I can run the lap times to go for the win. After my injury earlier in the season I am pretty much ruled out from winning the championship, but my aim for the rest of the season is to get on that top step.”
Stamper and his Barwellbased team are back in action at Cadwell Park, Lincolnshire, from August 27 to 29.