Simon Andrews of Lloyds British Yamaha earned his best qualifying position of sixth this weekend at the seventh round of British Superbikes and says it is down to things just coming together.
After sitting on the front row for several laps, he was pushed down to the second row by the end of the session, but that was nothing to be too disappointed about. The Evesham rider knocked a further 0'01.712s off his time that he set back in May at the third round of the championship, with which he qualified tenth.
He said: “After having a few weeks off it was strange coming back. Getting your brain up to speed, everything is whizzing past so you have to adjust. This weekend we have just progressed, crossed the t's and dotted the lines. We had the right tyres, time and I didn't get held up by other riders on track at any point.”
The team came into the season with sufficient funding, which allowed them to fully challenge and compete within the championship in 2008. He said: “This is a new team, it has been a big step and learning curve, but we are progressing. Also we didn't have all the parts from the very beginning.
“We now have a good chassis and at Mallory we struggled in practice, but it came good in the race. We've got a new swingarm and what we did was come here with the setting we used at Mallory and the bike is good. Once you get this you can push for the times. We are not using traction control yet, we used it for the first time this weekend and it broke, so we will try it again at Brands.”
Andrews means teh Brands Hatch round of World Superbikes which, for the first time, he will be entering as a wild card, along with the Donington round later on in the year. He said: “I like British Superbikes, I would only move to World or AMA, but staying with the thousands.”
With each round Andrews becomes closer to a podium and increasingly a pressure to other riders, looking into the season ahead and race day, he said: “We're taking it race by race, I've not been to Silverstone for a few years and I have never ridden a Superbike around Knockhill, but I don't think that is too much of a problem.
“As for tomorrow, even if we finished fifth, behind two Hondas and two Ducatis, to be able to be up with them and we are not a factory team, that would be like a win to us.”