Banks Racing’s Luke Hedger is one of the excitable new talents that has joined the Sunoco British 125GP Championship in which he outstandingly leads the cup championship and dazzled the crowd with a debut win in the first round of the season and his at British level.
The 15 year old has been racing since 2006 when he started on mini-motos before moving up to the 125cc arena. Throughout his career he has constantly finished within the top three of championships before clinching the GP3 Cup Championship title last year and finishing second overall in the main series.
Introducing himself to www.bikesportnews.com, he said: ‘My dad was a racer, he did track days. He always wanted to be a racer when he was a kid but his dad didn’t think much of racing so my dad was a boxer. Hes really atheletic. But when he got his first road bike he really loved it and my older brother, he got him one and then me.’
‘We did Thundersport last year, my family was expecting me to be tenth, at the first round I qualified on the second row and kept improving and got a win early on in the season. Then I kept getting good results after that. I didn’t expect to be in the front in BSB. I was expecting to about mid pack but never expected to be second in the championship and battling for the lead most of the time.’
The Bristol rider more than proved his ability and stole the show with taking the win at the opening round of 2011 with a two second gap. Hedger has only suffered one DNF so far, picked up what could be some valuable six points this weekend at Thruxton in wet conditions. This was after standing on the podium again in third at Croft, a circuit he had never been to before. As well as being cup leader this puts him second in the main championship behind regular and experienced championship leader Rob Guiver of SP125 Racing.
Talking about his win and the season ahead, he said: ‘I had done Brands Hatch a few times, I know where it goes from back when I did Thundersport. I normally was at the front most of the time. I had to get used to Croft because I had never been round and had to get used to the acceleration.’
‘I am trying for top ten, I would like to be in top ten all the time. I would like to be in the top three or the time but I just have to be happy with what I’m doing all the time and I’m going quicker every session. I am looking forward to all the tracks some I don’t know such as Croft, Thruxton, Knockhill. I did do some testing at the start of the season at Croft which did help. They are all one after the other so will be good to get them out the way as it’s only half way through the season so if I don’t do good I can catch up.’
Hedger, most definitely one to watch.
