Michael Pearson endured a mixed bag at a cold and windy Cookstown 100 on Saturday, with the former Irish Superbike Champion having to deal with everything from a practice spill to a race win.

Also for good measure, Pearson took a DNF in the first Superbike Race when the 36SC/Richard Rawson Honda encountered a false neutral leaving Pearson stranded at the side of the road after just one lap.

A practice spill in Fridays Supersport 600 timed session meant that Pearson was unable to clock a starting time for Saturday's Group A race and was forced to start at the back of Group B, in which the D&GW/Carryduff Forklift Yamaha rider stormed to a 13 second race win on corrected time.

Pearson then followed that up with a super fourth place finish in the Cookstown 100 Superbike race when he just narrowly missed out on a podium place after a good clean battle with Adrian Archibald.

"The whole weekend was a mixed bag really with just about everything happening. It all started with a first lap practice crash in the timed 600 session after I hit some debris on the road which had been left from a previous incident at that corner. I was fuming that I could not get back to the start/finish to get the bike looked at and try for a lap time, but the marshal's where having none of it," said Pearson.

"I got permission to start at the back of the B Race which I managed to win quite comfortably. In the first Superbike race, the Honda Fireblade kept hitting a false neutral and that was it, out of the race. We had a look at it before the Cookstown 100 race and found a wee kink in the selector rode which when fixed did the trick.

"I really enjoyed the Cookstown 100 race and was well pleased with fourth place behind Archibald and in front of Guy Martin. My own Superstock Honda is down on power and I was just being eaten up by Adrian Archibald on the long straight past the start/finish, so we will have to make a few alterations before this weekends Tandragee 100, a race which I always like competing in."