Andrews hits form then crashes!

The MSS Colchester Kawasaki team took nothing but positives out of a tough weekend’s racing at Cadwell Park despite DNFs and crashes. Timing sheet topping performances, hard-fought race results and a new lap record gave plenty to be happy about after the incident-packed Bank Holiday outing to Lincolnshire.

The MSS Colchester Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10R machines have traditionally shown great pace at the Lincolnshire circuit and Simon Andrews set about proving it with a confidence-boosting, time sheet-topping performance in Saturday’s first practice session. As practice and then qualifying sessions progressed, and riders settled into their race settings, Simon showed the form which saw him post MSS Colchester Kawasaki’s best placed finish of the season one year ago at Cadwell (third) with consistent lap times deep inside the highly competitive top five. He eventually ended the hotly-contended Swan Combi Roll for Pole session in a season’s best fifth place.

But it was harder work for the Colchester-based team come race day. Simon got bogged slightly off the line but pulled some dramatic moves around the outside of turns two and three to get himself on the back of the lead group of riders in a healthy seventh. As the race progressed, he made a decisive move to get himself past former MotoGP rider James Ellison as the lead six started to pull clear.

But what seemed like a certain top six finish was wiped away on lap 15 as Simon leant his ZX-10R over far enough to lift both wheels off the ground at the infamous Gooseneck. Falling heavily at the fast, off-camber turn Simon was relatively unscathed but his Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10R suffered badly in its altercation with the tyre wall. With Gary already forced to pull out the race with a technical problem on his bike it was not the result the team was hoping for after such strong qualifying.

With such extensive damage caused to the number 17 MSS Colchester Kawasaki, Simon was forced to watch race two from the Cadwell pit garage. Gary meanwhile was hampered by his early exit in race one and had to battle through from row six on the very tight Cadwell grid. But battle he did and quickly set about dicing with Stuart Easton for a place inside the top ten. With consistent laps and some decisive overtaking in a brilliant two lap spell, Gaz got the better of Easton and set himself up with a comfortable margin to bring it home in tenth.

Simon Andrews was disappointed with his Cadwell weekend but philosophical; “It was good to start the weekend with data from last year and we used that a lot to set ourselves off on the right foot. That showed with topping the sheets in the first practice and then always being inside the top five or six in every session. It shows the difference between here for instance and the last round at Brands where we didn’t have the base set-up.

We’re not quite sure what caused the crash because it’s hard to tell from what’s left but the data shows both wheels came off the ground at the same time so you’d have to say I decked it out. It’s hard not to feel down about it given the results but we come away from here with the knowledge the bike is working well, I’m riding well and that the next few tracks are good for us.”

After a difficult qualifying and a race one DNF, Gary was slightly buoyed with the outcome of race two with a hard-fought tenth in race two, “I’ve got to be happy with that after the weekend we’ve had and the grid position I started from (row six/17^th). We struggled all weekend with lots of niggly problems and it held us back all through qualifying, which has a big knock-on effect in this championship because it is so close.

A new engine for race two made all the difference because it made the bike feel a lot sharper and I’m pleased for the boys in the team who worked so hard to get the bike rebuilt in those two hours between races. The result is a positive and I’m really looking forward to Croft now.”

Howie Mainwaring made life hard for himself with a difficult qualifying leading to a fifth row starting position. Despite that Howie got a decent start and pulled four places back on the first lap. Battling in the pack is never an easy task and the opening laps were tough work for the Superstock 1000 competitor but Howie pushed his way through and by mid-race had settled into a battle for eighth place.

“We’ve been chasing the set-up all weekend and it’s been hard work. We’ve made changes through each session from practice to qualifying to morning warm-up and even before the race and it showed in the lap times during the race but it was too hard to get on the back of the leading group after that. Although it’s not what we wanted eighth is not a bad result given our start position.”

Danny Buchan battled hard aboard his Kawasaki Ninja ZX-6R in the Metzeler National Superstock 600 race after, for him at least, a lowly qualifying. The ever-eventful series has been boiling up nicely in the championship as Danny had been labelled Mr Consistent in hauling the long-time series leader Josh Day back. Things looked good in the early laps as Danny got the better of Day before a mistake at Hall bends dropped him back again. One new Superstock 600 lap record later and young Danny was on the tail of Day once more before a mistake at the super fast Charlies corner on lap six brought a premature end to his Cadwell weekend.

Team boss Nick Morgan said, “It might not look like it but we have come away with plenty of positives from this meeting! We started on such a high and it carried on through Sunday and into the races on Monday. Both riders worked hard and showed their pace and the bike is strong. We know we can run up there in the top six and this weekend shows it but we just need to piece it together – and some good luck for a change!

Despite Danny being a bit bruised and battered he has to be pleased with his weekend in the Superstock 600s. He maybe got a bit giddy after he got past Josh and then ran off the track but his lap times were phenomenal, good enough to be well up there in the Supersport class never mind Superstock, and to come away with a lap record is always a positive.

In the Superstock 1000s I know Howie knows it but really his qualifying was poor and it’s something we need to work on with him because he’s making life hard for himself. The difference between his qualifying pace and his race pace was one and a half seconds and that make his job in the race so much harder. That’s not to take anything away from his fantastic work-rate in the race and it was a fantastic result from where he was but he’d make his life so much easier to be up there at the start.

Overall we know we’re not up there in the top six of the championship for the final shootout and we’re maybe in the position now where we should have been a few round earlier. But it’s a matter of dotting the I’s and crossing the T’s. We’ll go back home to the workshop and trawl through some of the data to pick at the bones from here because there are still a few things we need to look at but we’re looking forward to Croft because it’s a track which suits us and we’re in a good position as a team to finish the season on a high.”