Round five of the British Supermoto Championship held at Three Sisters Race Circuit, at last saw some decent weather, with both the Saturday afternoon qualifying and Sunday’s racing held in breezy, but otherwise almost perfect sunny conditions.
Saturday qualifying was an amazingly close affair, with several riders heading the provisional leader board, until Sam Warren (SR Off-Road Aprilia SXV550) punched in a blinder of a lap just before the session close, to claim the overnight Pole Position. Coming on the heels of his overall victory at Teesside at round 4, it appeared that Warren had laid the gauntlet down to the rest of the field, but in the end, his weekend did not quite go to plan.
Instead, Matt Winstanley (Robinsons of Rochdale KTM 610 – pictured left) dominated Sunday’s racing with 3 wins from 3 races, the Wigan youngster pulling out all the stops at his ‘home’ race weekend. Winstanley didn’t have it easy however; In race one, a lightning start helped him comfortably lead the first part of the race, but both Warren and Christian Iddon (Factory Aprilia SXV550) were hunting the KTM rider down quite quickly. Warren was almost certainly on track to catch Winstanley before losing the front at the end of the main straight in quite spectacular style, he remounted to finish an uncharacteristic 14th. Iddon recovered from a very poor start, but couldn’t make up the amount of time lost and finished a distant 2nd.
In race 2 Winstanley again led from the start, Iddon chased very quickly, but lost time with a brief fall on the off-road section whilst Warren crashed again to retire after 5 laps. In the final race, Iddon claimed the start, but then lost the lead in the most spectacular “near-crash without actually crashing” moment which left the door open for Winstanley, who didn’t need asking twice. Warren despite a mighty charge from the back of the grid was sadly thwarted when the race was red-flagged due to another rider’s crash after just over 10 minutes. With all the drama at the front, nobody noticed rising star David Hartley (Robinsons of Rochdale KTM 550) claim another brilliant 3rd place on the podium much to the chagrin of some of his more experienced team mates.
Top 5 Open Class Championship Positions (after Round 5)- Christian Iddon 446 points
- Matt Winstanley 411 points
- Sam Warren 374 points
- Ady Smith 361 points
- David Hartley 335 points
In the smaller engined 450 class, things were spiced up for the weekend by wildcard rider Baptiste Rheims (Robinsons of Rochdale KTM 450) who after a cautious start on Saturday, set the paddock buzzing with his highly creditable performances on Sunday. Gallic flair wasn’t enough to stop runaway overall winner Ricky Higgs (Aprilia SXV450 – pictured left #17) however, the Staffordshire based ex-motocross rider bagging a 2nd, 2nd and a win in the 450 class to keep the title chase wide open. Arch rival Chris Hodgson (Robinsons of Rochdale KTM 450) kept one hand on the season’s trophy by recording a 3rd, 3rd and a 2nd in class with Rheims claiming the final spot on the podium with a 4th, a win and another 4th in the final race despite being punted off in a frenzied first corner melee, which saw several riders on the floor all of whom however, remounted and finished.
The British 450 Supermoto Championship battle truly has been one of variety, with five different winners at five different rounds and five different championship leaders to date. With a close points scoring system and yet another new challenge ahead of the riders at Silverstone, who will eventually claim the honours is anybody’s guess.
Top 5 450 Class Championship Positions (prior to Round 5 this weekend)- Chris Hodgson 349 points
- Ricky Higgs 332 points
- Keith Farmer 315 points
- George Clements 251 points
- Lee Jones 241 points
Round 6, the final round of the series will be held on the 22nd & 23rd of September at Silverstone International Race Circuit near Towcester.
Other awards at Three Sisters included:
Aprilia Contingency Awards- Lee Jones
- David Jackson
- Scott Woodacre
KTM Contingency Awards- James Addy
- Will Moore
- Scott Billington
Michelin “Rider of the day” Award – Baptiste Rheims
Michelin “Ouch that hurts award” – Chris “Van Den” Babbitt
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