Byrne celebrates double
Motorsport Cycling
Shane Byrne returned to the top of the British Superbike standings with his first double of the season.
He hadn’t won since the opening round at Donington but looked ominously good at Snetterton on Sunday, leading both races from start to finish after a five-week break.
Byrne had transmission problems on his PMB Kawasaki in the opening race but still finished a comfortable 2.685sec clear of title rival Josh Brookes, who went into the weekend top of the championship. Jason O’Halloran finished third.
There was a repeat podium in the second race but the margin of victory was greater as Byrne beat Brookes by 4.676.
The Sittingbourne rider leads Brookes 151-134 after four rounds and said: “The weekend feels pretty good with these two wins. We had a problem in the first race with the bike thinking that it was changing gear when it was not – that race was a lot harder than it looked.
“The guys fixed the bike and it was faultless in the second race. I watched my pit-boards, rode consistently and did what I had to do. Now it is onwards and upwards.”
Maidstone’s Devon Modell was hit by an alternator failure in round three of the Blancpain Endurance Series at Paul Ricard last weekend.
Modell and his Ecurie Ecosse team-mates were aiming for a place in the top six in the 1,000km race but a false start and problems with their BMW Z4 GT3 resulted in 14th place in the pro-am category.
Having recovered from the false start, the team were keeping pace with the competition until the alternator failure during Alasdair McCaig’s first stint.
A pit-stop saw Modell return to the fray eight laps down on the leaders but he gained valuable practice time ahead of next month’s 24 Hours of Spa in Belgium.
Team AMR endured mixed fortunes in their latest British F1 Sidecar Championship series in Norfolk.
Driver Matt Maclaurin and passenger Adrian Hope were returning to action after a seven-week absence but the Maidstone pair were forced to retire from last Saturday’s opening race at Snetterton.
A gear breakage in qualifying meant they started 16th and they had similarly poor luck as when fuel pump problems cut their race short on the 10th lap. Their 1,000cc Yamaha performed far better in Sunday’s televised race as a battle with West Midlands-based MK Racing ended with the duo one place behind in 10th.
The result leaves them 13th in the overall standings ahead of their first appearance at Scotland’s Knockhill circuit on July 3-5. Nick Malins won the San Fairy Ann 10-mile race to set the tone for an encouraging run of results for Maidstonebased 4t+ Velo. Malins took first place with a time of 21min 3sec and followed that with a 54.59 for second place in the SDW 25-mile time trial. There were thirdplaced finishes for Ian Jones in the 3rd cat race and Malcolm Davies in the 2/ 3/4 cat at the Medway Velo Crits event at the Cyclopark. Ian Vagg also came third in the 3/4 cat race at the Full Gas Series. Paul Kennedy (2.08.25) was 22nd in the KCA 50-mile time trial and Paul Chard 97th in the Ironman Triathlon in Staffordshire in 5:48.17. A textbook sprint finish saw Kevin Newline come sixth at the SERRL Kenardington course, while Stuart Baldwin and Craig Barton finished seventh and 15th respectively at Bethersden. Under-16 Toby Martin finished fourth in the Spring in the Park event at the Cyclopark, with Luke Match sixth. Matilda Collins and Josie Kelly also impressed.