Bridewell breaks Honda deadlock as Brookes crashes out

BSB Donington Park - Race Results (3)

Tommy Bridewell claimed his first British Superbike Championship win of the year with a crushing display of dominant riding in the final race of the weekend at Donington Park.

A contender for victory in race two before a mistake dropped him back, Bridewell had nonetheless already done enough to earn himself pole position for race three by virtue of his fastest lap and he made it count by getting the hole-shot into Redgate and simply accelerating clear.

Already two seconds up the road after two laps, Bridewell swelled his lead out to more than five seconds at one stage to take the chequered flag for only his fourth win of his BSB career, and his second with the Oxford Racing Ducati team.

His cause was aided somewhat by the only other riders capable of matching his pace – namely the race-winning Hondas of Andrew and Glenn Irwin – sitting further down the grid, the brothers were forced to fight back from seventh and 12th respectively.

Nonetheless, they made swift progress to the front of the chasing pack as they battled it out with Josh Brookes and Jason O’Halloran. However, that fight came to an ugly end when Brookes crashed heavily at the top of Craner Curves having seemingly been startled by Andrew Irwin coming up underneath him on the entry to the downward turn. Despite the fast crash, Brookes was able to pick himself up and walk away from the incident.

Andrew Irwin planted a last lap move on his brother Glenn Irwin – his third of the weekend – to secure second place, which together with his two wins from earlier in the weekend give him the early championship lead with five rounds remaining.

Glenn Irwin completed the podium on the second Honda, just holding off O’Halloran, who finished just behind the pair in a copy of race two.

Christian Iddon made up for Brookes’ exit with a run to fifth position, ahead of Massingberd-Mundy Kawasaki rider Danny Buchan and McAMS Yamaha rider Tarran Mackenzie, who couldn’t make his front row start work for him as he went backwards.

Kyle Ryde completed his impressive BSB debut for Buildbase Suzuki in eighth place, with Ryan Vickers and Lee Jackson rounding out the top ten.

Ninth position should have gone to Hector Barbera, who looked feisty battling for the podium during the first-half of the race before fading back. The Spaniard was then given a time penalty to drop him to 11th.