Ryan Vickers claimed his maiden British Superbike Championship victory at Brands Hatch on Saturday with the LAMI OMG Racing Yamaha rider winning a shortened Sprint race ahead of Danny Kent (Lovell Kent Racing Honda) and Christian Iddon (Oxford Products Ducati).

Pole man Tommy Bridewell (BeerMonster Ducati) took the holeshot and he led at the end of the first lap from Vickers, Kent, Leon Haslam (ROKiT BMW Motorrad), Jason O’Halloran (McAMS Yamaha) and Iddon with Glenn Irwin on the second BeerMonster Ducati running in eighth. Josh Brookes had had a disastrous opening lap though and dropped back to 11^th on the FHO Racing BMW.

Vickers moved into the lead second time around at Stirling’s with Kent following him by Bridewell shortly afterwards and whilst Haslam still ran in fourth, Iddon and Jack Kennedy (Mar-Train Racing Yamaha) were fifth and sixth, the front pack bunching up.

A lap later though, the front two of Vickers and Kent had pulled away by a second although Vickers had a big moment coming out of Surtees. Iddon was now up to third having overtaken both Haslam and Bridewell. The latter was beginning to lose time on each lap and by lap five had dropped back to seventh.

Back at the front and Vickers still led Kent at half-race distance, the gap between the two still only 0.209s, whilst they were still more than a second clear of Iddon. Kennedy was now up to fourth with Haslam and O’Halloran close behind. Bridewell still ran in seventh, a further second back.

However, the red flag came out at the start of the eighth lap due to track contamination, Haslam’s BMW believed to be smoking with the black/orange flag being shown at the same time to the former champion.

With the rain continuing to fall, the decision was made not to re-start the race which meant Vickers was awarded the win from Kent and Iddon with Kennedy, like Vickers and Kent, taking his best BSB position in fourth.

O’Halloran took fifth ahead of Haslam, Bridewell, Storm Stacey (Starline Racing Kawasaki), Peter Hickman (FHO Racing BMW) and Irwin with Brookes back in 13^th and Kyle Ryde 15^th although with two-thirds race distance not having been completed only half points were awarded so they didn’t lose as much ground in the title race as they potentially could.