Honda Racing’s Dan Linfoot set a 1’25.685 in the opening MCE British Superbike free practice session at Brands Hatch, and that time was good enough for him to go second on the timing screens.

But in between the free practice’s his team made a change to the engine braking, and it did not benefit the rider as much in the second session and he was two tenths slower this afternoon.

Linfoot’s team are working hard and the Fireblade is performing better than last year, with the Northerner going nearly one second quicker than he did at the GP track last year.

But gaining some ‘big points’ is Linfoot’s goal for this race weekend so that he can remain in Showdown contention.

“I am fairly happy, I nearly went as fast as this morning but not quite. But in general I went the best part of a second quicker from what I have ever been around here so it goes to show how much better the bike is this year than last year, or how I am riding - a combination,” said Linfoot, speaking to Bikesportnews.com at the track.

“But second and fourth is the right end of the timesheets - it is close out there. The goal this weekend has got to be to take two big points and hopefully two podiums and maybe a win. Thruxton was a bit of a disaster in terms of points for me so I need to recover as many as I can do, and not let Laverty escape and not let Ellison catch.

“We changed some engine braking stuff, I think maybe for the worse. Maybe it didn’t quite react how I wanted it too. I think we will make a step back towards where we were. The bike felt a bit too aggressive on the corner entry and I wasn’t able to roll through the corner as well as what I would like too. This morning I felt like I was running into the corner too fast, and it showed what a fine line we are working with. If I am this good today hopefully I can be this fast tomorrow and Sunday.”

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