E2E Racing News

Extreme weather makes for scary racing at Snetterton

"I had to miss the Practice and Qualifying sessions on Saturday due to attending a good friends wedding (Congratulations Tony & Jo - great day!)" Explains Lee.

"I knew I was going to be on the back foot, with the rest of the field being up to speed (especially as the weather was good on Saturday) by the time I turned up on Sunday morning. Fortunately we had another qualifying session, unfortunately it was raining and I had no chance of getting a decent time - especially as we had problems with the wet bike and literally had to limp it round for 3 laps just so I had done the required 3 laps in order to enter the races."

"So with no quick laps this year at Snetterton and starting from the back of the grid I lined up on the grid for race 1 on Sunday. The rain had stopped and the track was dry, but there was a hell of a wind making riding really hard work."

"It took me a lot longer to get down to a reasonable lap time than I thought it would take, by half race distance I started to get going, by this point Les Liney and Scot Adam were so far ahead I couldn't even see them as I entered the back-straight. I then found myself behind pro-bike that was heavily blowing oil and it took me a lap or two to have the confidence to get up behind him and pass as I was certain he was laying down oil and was going to crash."

"I eventually passed him and started trying to work on my lap times, I started to see Scot and Les and could see I was catching them by a couple of seconds a lap, but with them probably 10 seconds ahead of me did not think I would have time to catch them."

"Suddenly I found myself on the back of Scot, I'd been keeping an eye out for the last lap flag and had not seen it, so when I caught Scot I planned to pass him on the next lap, but as we crossed the finish line the chequered flag was out! - Gutted, as I could have pushed and made a pass round the last corner. Still relatively happy with the race considering lack of track time and the weather and I set the fastest lap by 1 second for the Supertwins."

"Well chuffed for my buddy Les Liney who rode an awesome race and took the win, he's just getting used to the 1098 and I'm sure his pace will increase as the season goes on."

"Monday brought changeable weather and still the strong wind - that strong awnings were blow away and all sorts, it was very scarey down the back straight!"

"The first race started dry and I took the lead in the Supertwins and started to pull a gab, then it started to rain! Out on slick tyres I started to struggle, but pushed on, as soon as I saw the GP1 bike ahead of me leaving tracks in the wet tramac and a few of the front runners crashing out I really knocked off the pace."

I rode round expecting Les to come by (he'd got treaded tyres on) and sure enough he did, but I tried to hang on to him, then Scot came past. The following laps turned into an awesome race, with all 3 of us taking the lead whilst trying to work out how much grip there was. On the last lap I was in 2nd and planned to pass Les into Russels, but Les managed to pass a GP1 bike just before and I could not make the pass, but finished 2nd in the Twins."

The 2nd race started late and started spitting rain as we headed to the grid, with slicks on again I knew it was going to be hard work again. Scot Adam took the lead with me right on his tail, but all the time trying to feel for grip as it continued to rain in places on the ciruit. I was happy following Scot around and watching to judge the grip levels from his pace then on lap 7 as we headed to turn one there was a wall of rain, I tip-toed through turn 1 and headed for turn 2 where there was a wall of hail stones to greet us and the race was red flagged."

Well done to Les and Scot on there wins, a bit frustraiting for me as I know if we'd have had dry races I would have took the wins on Sunday and was aiming to push for top 5/6 in the GP1 races, but really glad to have come away from the meeting in one piece and a good lump of points."

Gutted for Duncan Gibson who had engine problems during testing and went home, I'm certain he would have done well at the weekend and the rest of us would have had to pull the pin to keep up with Dunc, especially when the weather turned bad!"