Jason O Halloran had an outstanding ride and gained his first podium of the season on the East Coast Racing Yamaha at the penultimate round of the British Supersport Champion at Silverstone. In the extremely wet conditions Jason finally earned himself a fantastic third place after gaining a great start from 10th place on the grid. He has also managed to promote himself to seventh in the overall Championship standings.
The weather conditions were changeable all weekend and Jason was strong in the wet on Friday morning setting a time that put him eighth fastest. Although the weather dried up for Saturday's qualifying sessions the track temperature was extremely cold. Jason struggled to put in a fast time during qualifying and could only manage to gain tenth on the grid after the second qualifying session. After a number of overnight changes that the team made to his bike, Jason was fifth fastest in morning warm up and was looking for a good result in the race.
The initial race was re-started after a big crash on the first corner which involved his team-mate Pat McDougall. On the re-start, the race was cut to eight laps and Jason got an awesome start and was soon settled into fourth place and was keeping a close eye on the leaders. The wet conditions were horrendous but this did not stop the young Australian putting in some incredibly fast lap times and reeling in the leaders. He was soon sat on the back of a two man battle between Ben Wilson and James Westmoreland for second place. The pairing were making passes on each other every lap and Jason was watching every move closely, until Wilson lost the front and crashed out on lap seven, allowing Jason to take the final step of the podium.
A delighted Jason said "Finally the podium I've been looking for all season. It's been a hard weekend with a few ups and downs but the end result was ideal! I'm just chuffed to bits for all the team and myself, but the team have worked so hard since I joined them mid season at Mallory Park and we've been working for this ever since. The weather conditions certainly weren't ideal but hopefully things will carry on like this for Oulton and I can get myself another good result there. I just like to thank everyone involved who have supported me this year and I couldn't have done it without them!"
It was a nightmare weekend for his team-mate Pat McDougall who was unfortunately involved in a first lap crash after hitting a fallen bike. He said "It's just been a total nightmare this weekend; I was still injured from my big crash at Croft but was quite looking forward to riding in the wet conditions as it would have slowed the pace down a little. A got a great start but because of the spray into the first corner I was unable to see the bike that was laying in the track, I hit it hard and have hurt my foot but it's just been a nightmare, I'm gutted."
Team Manager Phil Reed said "I'm over the moon for Jason this weekend it's just mega. We've worked really hard all year and nice to get this back as a reward and now we're really looking forward to getting to Oulton and ending the season on a high. We're gutted for Pat crashing out, once again it wasn't his fault and hope he'll be fit enough to race at Oulton in a couple of weeks time."
Round 12 Oulton Park 8th - 9th - 10th October
