2022 British Superbike Donington Park: O’Halloran doubles up on Sunday

Jason O'Halloran got to taste victory twice on Sunday after again getting the better of Bradley Ray at Donington during round three of the BSB Championship.

Race Two had seen the McAMS Yamaha rider able to pull away confidently over the closing stages, and although race three had the same result it was a very different outing on track thanks to an interval behind the safety car.

The field lined up behind the saftey car after Leon Haslam suffered a violent highside, which saw his Kawasaki break into three pieces as the impact with the ground was so violent. The crash left Glenn Irwin, who was sat in behind, nowhere to go but into the gravel too, both riders walked away from the accident, but with bits of bike all over the track a clean up was needed.

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• 2022 British Superbike Donington Park - Race Results (3)
• 2022 British Superbike Donington Park- Race Results (2)

The Australian had worked his way back up to third by the time the safety car appeared on track and as it dimished the on track gaps, it made for an open race.

It wasn’t an immediate advantage for O’Halloran, with Kyle Ryde using the situation to his advantage too to launch a bid for position:

‘Straight after the safety car Kyle (Ryde) passed me into turn one and I thought ‘I could do without this’ as I thought Brad (Ray) was going to get away as he had really good pace’.

O’Halloran made swift work of getting back thorugh and then launched his attack for the win:

‘ I got through these guys quite quickly, I started to reel Brad back in and I sort of knew I had a little bit more, I got to the front and I thought I could get to the end’.

Turnaround for O’Halloran and McAMS Yamaha

The result marks a change in fortunes for both rider and team, after a strong showing by both their ruders last season, the number 22 was yet to reach the podium after two rounds and his Team-mate  - reigning champion Tarran MAckenzie was out with injury.

His first two rostrum visits have both been wins and push O’Halloran straight up to second in the overall standings, with a 28 point deficit to Ray. With Mackenzie back in the points in evey race too the team held the view that their championship had really gotten underway at Donington.

The result also saw O’Halloran pick up both Rider of the Round and the King of Donington trophy.

‘The safety car wasn’t ideal’

Leading at the arrival of the safety car, arguably Bradley Ray lost out the most as the advantage he had built on track vanished.

Speaking on it’s appearance ray added:

‘The saftey car wasn’t ideal in that race but I knew straight away after the safety car I had to put in a few fast laps to try and break the group again as I knew myself and Jason (O’Halloran) had a bit more pace than the others.

With the eventual race winner quickly free of Ryde and chasing him down, Ray’s plan didn’t quit come to fruition, he conceeded it came down to raw pace from O’Halloran:

‘Jason had better pace than me in the last part of the race, we made a few changes… just not enough to fight for the victory today'.

His three podiums ( third yesterday and two second places on Sunday), when added to his Oulton Park results saw Ray awarded the Milwaukee Spring Summer Slam trophy.

Third was also a repeat return for Lee Jackson.

The Cheshire Mouldings FS-3 rider cited the hard work his Kawasaki mechanics made to tweak his bike, as well as the safety car appearance, which allowed him to score back-to-back rostrum visits:

‘Two podiums is a solid round three again and just a massive credit to my team for working hard and putting a great bike underneath me’.

Kyle Ryde had set a new lap record before his fall in race two, which lead to both sides of the Rich Energy OMG garage mucking in to hurredly frantically rebuild his Yamaha after the front was destroyed in it’s exit from that race.

They did a good enough job to allow Ryde to return to track and be competitive, but he was passed in the run to the line by another rider using a rapidly fixed bike as Rory Skinner, who had crashed his Cheshire Mouldings Kawasaki earlier in the weekend leading to it needing a lot of TLC, as he staged a comeback after running at the front early in the race.

Chris Iddon was a lonely sixth for Buildbase Suzuki, ahead of a fierce battle for seventh.

Tom Sykes lead that over the line for his best result so far this season with MCE Ducati, ahead of his team-mate Josh Brookes.
He beat Danny Buchan (SYNTEIQ BMW Motorrad) to eighth after much switching of positions in the group. The final move saw Crowe Performance BMW’s Chrissy Rouse catch and move into tenth after a late lunge past Mackenzie.

Mackenzie had pushed his body to the limit for sixth in race two and one more 26 lap race proved to much. Aching all over and with arm pump symptoms as he compensated for what his lower body could not do, Eleventh was still an impressive finish.

Andrew Irwin was twelfth for SYNTEIQ BMW Motorrad.

The remaining points went to Honda’s Ryo Mizuno in 13th, Storm Stacey (Team LKQ Euro Car Parts Kawasaki) in 14th and Honda’s Takumi Takahashi in 15th. In a race which saw only sixteen finishers Dan Jones was the only rider to take the chequered flag and miss out on a point s finish.

After making up eight positions apiece, Andrew Irwin, Ryo Mizuno and Dan Jones were all awarded the Fast Forward award for picking up the most places in the race.