AMD Motorsport’s Richard Kerr produced a heroic fightback from the back of the field to tenth at Cadwell Park on Monday, venue for round eight of the Pirelli National Superstock Championship. The County Donegal rider was pushed wide and onto the grass at the first corner but fought through the pack to claim six valuable points to maintain second place in the standings and keep his title hopes alive.
Picking up from where he left off at the previous round at Thruxton, where he scored two podiums, Richard was immediately on the pace at Cadwell and, after recording the second fastest time in practice, he took the same position in Saturday’s qualifying session behind fellow Honda rider Billy McConnell. That gave him a front row position, crucial for the tight and twisty 2.18-mile Lincolnshire circuit.
However, Richard’s race was immediately compromised when he got caught up in a first corner, first lap melee which saw Ashley Beech crash out and force several riders take to the grass, including Richard. It saw him drop more than twenty places where he then set about clawing back as many positions as possible.
Lapping, as expected, at a similar pace to the leaders, he moved up into the points on lap five and grabbed a top ten position on the 12th lap when he overhauled Simon Reid. Tenth was ultimately where he finished and whilst championship leader Dan Linfoot finished second, the six points for tenth means the 23-year old remains in second overall, 27 points behind Linfoot.
Richard Kerr: “I’m absolutely gutted with the outcome as we had the pace all weekend to fight for the win and the team did a great job in giving me the bike to do the job. Unfortunately, I had a coming together with another rider that crashed at turn one and with nowhere to go, I ended up going onto the grass and lost a lot of time. I was lucky to stay on, but the impact bent my handlebar and broke the bodywork, but I regrouped and made my way back up to tenth place, so we’ll take the points and look forward to the next round. A huge thanks to AMD Motorsport and all my team for their hard work.”
Fraser Dykes, Team Owner: “Despite missing FP2 due to a heavy rain, and then a highside at the bottom of the Mountain in qualifying, our weekend was still very much on track with Richard second fastest to Billy McConnell. That put us on the front row for our only race of a very long weekend but, unfortunately, an over-exuberant, in my opinion, rider clipped Richard while falling forcing him onto the grass and almost last!! Coming through to tenth with a bent handlebar was some ride and slight compensation for the ground lost in the championship but with six races to go in the championship we are very much still in it so onto Oulton Park for the next round.”
The next round takes place at Oulton Park on September 15-17.
Pictures by Tim Keeton (Impact Images Photography)
Championship positions (after eight rounds)
1 Dan Linfoot (Honda) 254pts
2 Richard Kerr (AMD Motorsport Honda) 227
3 Alastair Seeley (BMW) 181
4 Joe Talbot (Honda) 168
5 Billy McConnell (Honda) 153
6 Lewis Rollo (Aprilia) 146
