Glenn Irwin won a dramatic opening British Superbike Championship race at Oulton Park on Sunday afternoon and re-claimed the championship lead by 3.5pts after BeerMonster Ducati team-mate Tommy Bridewell – who crossed the line first – was hit with a three-second penalty.

Bridewell was deemed to have made an incorrect re-start after a safety car period which saw him hit with a long lap penalty but with no time to take it, he was demoted to sixth. That put Lee Jackson (Cheshire Mouldings Kawaski) and Kyle Ryde (LAMI OMG Racing Yamaha) up to second and third.

Bridewell made an ideal start from pole position to lead into the first corner, but team-mate Irwin’s start was even better as he went from fifth to second and at the end of the opening lap, they were followed by Ryde, Leon Haslam (ROKiT BMW Motorrad Team), Jackson and Ryan Vickers on the second OMG machine.

The gap between the leading two riders was just 0.076s after two laps and it was Irwin now in the lead after a late move at Lodge whilst Ryde remained in third, half a second adrift. Further back, Josh Brookes (FHO Racing BMW) had moved up to sixth at the expense of Vickers.

The top six remained the same after three laps but Honda Racing’s Tim Neave and Franco Bourne had already crashed out in separate incidents with tenth placed Jack Kennedy (Mar-Train Racing Yamaha) coming to grief at Old Hall at the start of lap four.

Jackson was the fastest rider on track and, indeed, the top five riders were closing back up with just over a second covering them at one-third race distance. Brookes, still in sixth, was now more than three seconds further back.

Bridewell was back in the lead after Irwin made a mistake at Hizzy’s although only 0.084s split them as they started the seventh lap, Ryde, Haslam and Jackson following in quick succession.

The Ducati riders began to edge away from their pursuers once more, the gap back to Ryde almost three quarters of a second after seven laps and whilst sixth placed Brookes was some 5.4s off the lead, he was locked in battle with Vickers, Christian Iddon (Oxford Products Ducati) and Jason O’Halloran (McAMS Yamaha).

By half race distance, Haslam and Jackson had been dropped with the Kawasaki rider taking fourth place from his elder rival at the start of lap 11 whilst back at the head of the field, Ryde was continuing to hold onto Bridewell and Irwin, although by lap 12 his hopes looked to have gone with the gap to the leaders having shot up to two seconds, no surprise given Bridewell set a new fastest lap of 1’34.099.

However, on lap 14 the safety car came out after Storm Stacey (Starline Racing Kawasaki) crashed at the top of Clay Hill and when racing resumed two laps later, it meant the pack was together with just three laps to go.

After accelerating out of Druids, Bridewell backed the pack up at Lodge which led to several riders overtaking each other – against the rules – before getting back in line and that led to him being dramatically hit with a long lap penalty. But with no time to take it, he had 3s added to his race time which dropped him back to sixth.

That meant Irwin got his second win of the weekend ahead of Jackson and Ryde with Haslam and Brookes also finishing ahead of Bridewell. Iddon, O’Halloran, Vickers and Peter Hickman (FHO Racing BMW) completed the top ten.