Airwaves Yamaha boss Colin Wright has revealed he knew that his riders had podium pace after scrutinising lap data on Sunday night at Brands Hatch - but didn't tell anyone in his team so as not to get their hopes up.
Kent youngster Leon Camier won the second race at Brands using a bike that was started for the first time on Wednesday and was around 20BHP down on the competition - the R1 engine only has a modified cylinder head, kit cams and a kit ECU.
Speaking to bikesportnews.com this morning, Wright said: "The bike is the same as Spies and Sykes used at the first World Superbike test at Portimao last year and it is a measure of how much Leon has grown up as he was only trying to pass where he knew he could.
"We knew there was no point in trying to get past anyone on the straight so both James and Leon could only get past at Druids if they had enough speed out of Paddock, or coming out of Surtees. That's what we did with Shane last season.
"On Sunday night, I looked at the lap analysis and I thought we had the pace to challenge for podiums but I didn't tell the rest of the team because I didn't want to get their hopes up.
"If you'd have asked me on Wednesday night when we loaded the trucks, I would have been more than happy with the results from race one but Leon's win was incredible.
"Leon had been on a stock R1 in Spain a week or so ago but James hasn't touched a bike since the end of last season so his results from the weekend weren't what we expected either. It's a bit of a fairytale."
