Bardney racer Ivan Lintin bagged a second place finish in the Manx GP Newcomers race on his very first visit to the Isle of Man races; he also completed the Junior Manx GP in 13th place and the Lightweight event in sixth position.
Practice was plagued by the poor weather conditions and if it wasn’t raining then the visibility was poor because of mist on the mountain section of the course giving very limited practice time ahead of the three events.
But Lintin settled into the 37.7-mile mountain course very well and completed his practice for the Newcomers race in fourth place. Riding the Sunfish UK sponsored 750cc Suzuki, Lintin started the first race of the week in atrocious conditions with fog bringing visibility down to less than 30 yards in places. With this in mind the race officials cut the Newcomers event to just two laps instead of the original four.
Lintin came home in second place behind Isle of Man local rider Ryan Kneen.
Lintin:
“Obviously Ryan had the advantage of local knowledge and the conditions out there were very dicey. But if it had been a dry race then I am confident I could have won.”
Next up was the Junior Manx GP, again suffering from inclement weather conditions and cut from four laps to three. After just three laps of practice on the Sunfish UK/Bardney Racing 600cc Suzuki Lintin started from 56th place. Despite being 26th fastest in practice he was allocated a start number much further back and made slow progress through the field after becoming stuck in traffic. But he soldiered on and finished the race in a creditable 13th position.
The third and final outing for Lintin was the Lightweight race where again practice time had been limited because of the weather and some crank problems with the 250cc McKinstry racing machine, which took two days to rectify.
The race was delayed until Saturday because of more bad weather and Lintin finally got underway only to find the he had a problem. He pulled in at the end of the first lap for adjustments and went on to complete the race in sixth position.
Lintin sees more race action when he returns to Southern Ireland for the Killalane Road races on September 14, which incorporates the final round of the Irish Road Racing championship where Lintin currently holds 6th place in the 250cc class.
Find out more about the Manx GP here - manxgrandprix.org
