After two rounds of the 2021 Bennetts British Superbike Championship, Glenn Irwin and Honda Racing have yet to show the form that saw them lead last year’s series for two thirds of the season.

Illness, going in the wrong direction with initial setup and a crash didn’t help his cause at the weekend but, despite being in 12th in the standings, he left Scotland in an upbeat mood and confident a corner had been turned.
 
“I’m not in the best shape at the moment, from a physical point of view, and am just feeling drained all the time,” Irwin explained. “It’s been going on for a couple of months and it’s preventing me from training like I would do normally whether it’s going running or getting out on the motocross bike and getting to the end of the races is a challenge.

"I’m a very strong character though and quitting isn’t in my DNA so I’m planning on getting some tests between now and Brands to try and get to the bottom of it.”
 
In the second year with the new Fireblade, it was the first time the team had raced at Knockhill after it was omitted from the shortened 2020 season and Irwin admitted they made some wrong decisions with set-up on Saturday. However, they regrouped for Sunday’s races where, although 11th was his best result after suffering a crash in race two, he was a lot happier with the performance.

We made some errors as a team on Saturday with the set up and changed far too much with the bike. It’s the second year with the bike and we obviously have a lot more things to try, electronics, a new offset and chassis settings for example, and you only learn and progress by trying all the options but we changed too much. It was a frustrating day.”

“We went back to basics a bit for Sunday and regrouped and responded in the right manner. The bike felt loads better. 11th doesn’t show that but I was in the TV shot for much of the race and at the back of the snake. If we’d have started the weekend with the bike we finished, I’m sure the results would have been different.”
 
“We were strong in the second race too and the likes of O’Halloran, Jackson and Hickman were only just in front of us. Gino (Rea) did the right thing by pulling off the racing line when his bike was losing oil but I was just making a move to pass him at the time and had nowhere to go. The crash was only 1% of the race though and the other 99 per cent was positive with our lap times comparable to the guys who finished on the podium.”
 
“We’re obviously not where we want to be in the Championship but Andrew (Irwin) proved the Honda works well at Brands and it won’t be until rounds four or five that the Championship table will show its true colours.”