Just three points is the difference between Jeremy McWilliams and Australia’s Jed Metcher (Scott Owen Race Developments/ RaceCenter/Batteries North) as they head into tomorrow’s final two races which will sort out the winner for this year’s Ken Wootton Perpetual Trophy.
Drawing the first blood in race one was three times Australian Shawn Giles (TBR/D&D/Springwood Suzuki)(who was tucked away in second position behind DMR Motorsport’s Cam Donald, who snared the hole-shot and led for the few opening laps. Donald was followed closely by Giles and Metcher, with a hard charging McWilliams in fourth. When Giles took the lead from Donald, McWilliams got past Metcher then set about chasing down Giles after he got by Donald.
bikesportnews.com later learnt that Metcher had dropped off the pace due to an experimental gear changing that would have been good for the channel ferry, but not a Katana. Metcher later explained it as being a bit “how-Ya’-Going.”
Up front, it was a battle battle-royale between the dual trophy winners as it came down to the very end of the race where it was just .095sec between the pair.
Donald, finished 2.674sec behind Giles with Metcher .619sec behind with Glen Richards rounding out the top five.
Race two is where things seemed to happen. Once again it was Donald leading off the line, this time with Metcher right up his rear. On lap two Metcher got the better hand of his good mate going through the Hayshed. The next lap, heading into turn four Donald hit a fault neutral which forced him to pull off. In the end he called it a day.
Giles went from a race win to a DNF as well. Giles pulled in on the pits on the warm up lap after his Suzuki Katana started to drop from three to two cylinders coming into turn four. It was understood that his bike had dramas with an electrical problem.
“You know you want to win for Australia, but you also want to win for yourself” said Giles. “I feel sorry for the TBR guys because they have been working nonstop all weekend on the bike. With Steve [Martin]’s misfortunates yesterday to get caught up in oil and then changing engines and other stuff, I really feel sorry for these guys! It’s a shame for the team and of course the Australian team. But tomorrow is another day, as the Aussies say, “get on it, and get on it”.
Steve Martin’s weekend to date has been close to disastrous. The team installed a second, but it obviously was not the goods – with Martin grinding to a stop on the main straight in race one, and pulling back into the pits on the warm up lap of race two. He ends the day with a DNF and DNS, and no points in the bank.
“It’s a conglomeration of problems that started from yesterday when I crashed on turn one on somebody’s oil. It destroyed my good motor and unfortunately we did not have a chance to fix it, so we put in a spare motor and it was leaking oil and it was not running right,” said Martin, the former endurance champion who relishes in Island Classic racing.
“Today’s been very average so we are taking the replacement engine out, and we are fixing the engine I qualified on overnight, so hopefully tomorrow we can have a good race. I’m a bit paranoid about oil at the moment, so I’m not taking any chances,” said Martin.
With all this drama, it left Metcher to lead the way with his former team manager of the Riva Moto Team, McWilliams to apply a full fight. Metcher held his ground until the second last lap when McWilliams drafted by Metcher down the main straight,0.199sec was the difference between McWilliams and Metcher. “That second race was pretty good’ Metcher. Metcher thinks once he and the team make a slight little change to the bike he will be in contention for a race win tomorrow. “We have a little bit of work today and hopefully that will make us go faster.”
Coming home in third place was former 500cc GP racer and BSB racer, now turned sports editor of Australian Motorcycle News, Paul Young. Young was 6.368sec from McWilliams.
Ryan Farquhar was fourth with Brendan Roberts in fifth. Conor Cummins, Mike Edwards, John McGuinness, Craig Ditchburn “Milspec Manufacturing” and Damien Kavney completed the top ten.
With two races to go, McWilliams leads the points table for the Ken Wootton Perpetual Trophy on 79-points from Metcher on 76 and Roberts on 71, with Farquhar just one point behind.
In regards to the team points, Us Aussies lead the charge on 354, just a slender seven points ahead of you guys (UK) on 347. USA are sitting third on 234, three points ahead of the Kiwis.
