Alastair Seeley will line up in pole position for the Superstock races at the North West 200 with a stunning lap of 123.203mph on the Tyco BMW not only being inside the class lap record but also only 0.09s outside Michael Dunlop’s outright lap record set in last year’s Superbike race.
Seeley was top of the pile for much of the session but it took him until near the end to overhaul Michael Rutter for pole, the Bathams/SMT Racing BMW rider unable to better his Tuesday lap of 122.025mph and ending some 2.5s adrift of Seeley.
He was second quickest on Thursday as a dusty track kept speeds slightly down with only a small number of riders improving and the second to fourth fastest times were all set on Tuesday so Lee Johnston (East Coast Construction BMW) and Ian Hutchinson maintained their third and fourth places.
Dean Harrison (Silicone Engineering Kawasaki) quickened his pace to 120.446mph but this still saw him stay in fifth position with the same happening to Martin Jessopp, the Riders Motorcycles BMW rider moving from 119.443mph to 120.140mph. to remain in the last spot on the second row.
Michael Dunlop (MD Racing Suzuki) also improved his speed slightly but remained in seventh whilst James Hillier (JG Speedfit Kawasaki) jumped from 12th to eighth after lapping at 119.541mph. Former lap record holder Horst Saiger (saiger-racing.com Kawasaki) took ninth with William Dunlop claiming tenth on the Temple Golf & Country Club Yamaha.
There were a number of high profile retirements early in the session with Guy Martin being black flagged at Metropole, Peter Hickman stopping at Black Hill and the same fate befalling Ivan Lintin at Nicholls.
All three failed to register a time with Hickman slipping back from eighth to 11th as he broke down while Martin and Lintin will start from 16th and 23rd respectively.
