In the glorious sunshine in front of a huge crowd at the World Superbike race at Donington Park the Be Wiser Kawasaki team were able to shine at round four of the Pirelli National Superstock Championship. In the Stock 1000 race 25-year-old Josh Day from Swindon secured a stunning fourth place in a fraught race with his team-mate Josh Wainwright also getting into the points in 13th place.
It was a mixed weekend with weather conditions and the Friday sessions were null and void with heavy rain and extremely windy the Be Wiser Kawasaki team played on the cautious side and did not spend very much time out on track. With the conditions taking a considerable turn for the better on Saturday and Sunday it was great for racing but not ideal for track time with only one qualifying session on the Saturday. Josh Day qualified in ninth and Wainwright in 16th.
Day got a really good start and was lying in sixth after the opening lap of the 12-lap race, on lap sixth he made a small mistake and had to run straight on across the Esses which cost him time and places, he dropped back to seventh but got his head down and re grouped himself setting some good lap times and making some strong passes to take him up to a solid fourth.
Josh Day - "I'm really pleased with the result I got today at Donington, it's really good to race here in front of the World Superbike crowd and to get a good result also is mega. We made a little mistake in qualifying which put me a bit further back on the grid than I would have liked. I showed the pace today that I can run up at the front and the bike felt really good. Colin from 100% has worked so hard to get the bike set up right and we've a really good base setting now. The effort that Alan and Paul also put in is a massive confidence boost they have allowed me plenty of track time and I feel really happy with everything and the way we are going. Hopefully I can push for a podium at the next few rounds."
Wainwright qualified in 16th place on the Be Wiser Kawasaki and held his position after the first lap and was soon setting good lap times and making a couple of confident passes working his way into a points scoring position of 13th place.
Josh Wainwright - "I'm happy with getting in the points today, I really struggled with arm pump in the last three laps and I dropped a couple of places back from what I was. I was running in 11th at one point and everything was feeling really good, the arms were really sore towards the end of the race and I just wanted to bring the bike home safely. We made some massive changes to the bike on Friday and so I had to try and get used to that but it feels great and pleased with the pace I was running."
In the Superstock 600 class Nick Anderson qualified in 19th place on the grid but sadly was forced to pull out of the race with a technical problem at the end of lap seven.
Nick Anderson - "I'm a tad disappointed not to have finished the race today and I had a problem from the start of the race I tried to carry on but it just wasn't allowing me to keep going. I felt pretty good all weekend but with the bad weather on Friday once again we didn't get much time out on track."
Team Owner/Manager Alan Grieg - "Once again the British weather didn't play into our hands on Friday and we struggled to get any time out on track as it was so bad. This only left us with one session on the Saturday in both classes to get a set-up, iron out any problems and set a qualifying time for the races.
Once again we have taken big steps forward this weekend and each time we have been improving, Josh (Wainwright) did a great job today to get into the points and he is making huge progress at every round in his first year on the 1000 machine, he made some massive changes on Friday and only had the Saturday to get it tested and tried out. I'm really pleased with the fourth place that Josh (Day) got it's a great result for the Be Wiser Kawasaki team and a huge confidence boost for him also. He gained this result also after taking an excursion across the gravel.
In the Superstock 600 class the riders did not get a warm up session and the small problem that Nick had during the race would have been found and fixed if they'd been allowed to have a warm up. We're really disappointed about this but Nick himself has been making huge progress in every session but with no warm up this put us on the back foot.
As a team I'm really happy with how this weekend has gone, Josh Day rode a great race and it was a big confidence boost for us all. We're looking forward to getting back to the British Championship series at Knockhill in the middle on June and hopefully we can start aiming more for podiums as it's proved the times are there it's just a case of putting everything together."
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