Beowulf Racing's Dan Linfoot and Gino Rea experienced the highs and lows of racing at Monza this weekend. Coming into the third round of the European Superstock Championship, Linfoot led the championship standings after his impressive victory last time out at Assen, but a string of technical problems onboard the Beowulf Racing Yamaha R6 prevented him from starting the race today.
Meanwhile team-mate Gino Rea put in another trademark gutsy ride to secure eighth place and eight valuable championship points.

Having raced at the historic Italian circuit last weekend in the Italian Championship in preparation for the event, the team arrived in confident mood and focussed on another podium finish. On the first day of qualifying Linfoot was unable to replicate the pace he'd shown during last weekends race and elected to replace the engine, but a technical problem saw his number one motor blow.
The team worked until 1am this morning to prepare another bike but experienced another engine blow up during the first lap of the second qualifying session, which left him without a bike to ride in this afternoon's race.

Despite the no point score the 19 year old from Harrogate has only slipped two positions in the championship standings and now holds third spot with seven rounds remaining.

Whilst Linfoot was unable to race, team-mate Gino Rea secured another strong result for the Beowulf Racing team despite having to deal with his own technical problems that meant he couldn't run his number one engine in the race. Despite the set-back Rea qualified on the second row and secured his best result of the year with a determined eighth place finish. In the two-part race, which was red flagged following a huge multi rider crash at the first chicane, Rea showed that he had the pace to run with the leaders and finished just 6.5 seconds off the race winner Loris Baz.

Rea's consistency has now seen him secure three top ten finishes in the opening three rounds and move up to eighth overall in the championship standings.

Dan Linfoot - Non starter, Championship position 3rd
"It's obviously disappointing not to start the race, but I'm philosophical about it and we'll be back at the front at the next race that's for sure. It would have been good to get points on the board and keep my championship lead but I guess it just wasn't meant to be. A few of the front guys ended up fourth or fifth today so points wise we're still well in the mix."

Gino Rea - Race 8th, Championship position 8th
"I'm disappointed with the finish to be honest because we were lacking some speed on the straight, which meant it was very hard for me to overtake, but easy for me to lose places.
"In both the starts I got off the line well and made up some places and I'm actually happy with how I was riding through the corners because I was as fast as anyone today. It's frustrating because I honestly believe that if I could have used the faster, number one engine I had in qualifying I could have been on the podium."

Andy Stone -Team Manager
"Gino has done a good job this weekend. He's secured more points for the team and rode really well in the second half of the race with lap times as fast as the leaders.
"With reference to Dan, it's been a tough weekend and we've had some really bad luck. In a way we've been a victim of our own success and have run into problems due to all the testing we've been doing, which has allowed us to run at the front of the championship. We've got a break now until the middle of June so we will go back to the workshop, regroup and come back even stronger."