British 125cc Championship Cadwell Park - Low beats pain at Cadwell for strong finish

May 24, 2010 - PRLog -- Simon Low narrowly missed out on scoring championship points for the second time this season when he finished 17th in round 4 of the British 125cc Championship, an heroic ride given that a collision on the opening lap had caused him to suffer a cracked fibia bone! Held at Cadwell Park, Lincolnshire, Low fought his way through the pack from 27th to pull up to 17th at two thirds race distance but ultimately ran of time to climb any higher. However, he had been as high as 14th before the collision took place and dropped him down the order so it was most definitely a strong ride by the 22-year old and confidence boosting for the whole team.

Throughout practice, Simon consistently reduced his lap times as he edged closer to the top 20 and, after being 5.9seconds off the fastest time in free practice, he chopped over a second off his time in Saturday's first qualifying session to lie in 23rd place, now 4.8seconds off the pace setting reigning British Champion James Lodge. In extremely warm temperatures during second and final qualifying, Simon took almost three quarters of a second off his time and a 1m38.6s lap was the 22nd fastest of the session. However, when the times for the two sessions were combined, Simon was placed 25th overall although he was pleased to have had a relatively troublefree two days and was looking forward to the race.

Sunday saw even hotter temperatures for the 14-lap race and, with a new hydraulic clutch fitted, Simon made a lightning start and found himself up to a brilliant 14th place half way round the first lap just behind Championship contender Rob Guiver. However, as he exited the hairpin, the bike tried to highside him and he was hit from the side by another bike causing them both to run off the track also damaging Simon's leg in the process. This dropped him all the way back to 27th but, despite the pain, he battled back and by lap 4 he was up to 23rd when the safety car came out for three laps. When it pulled in, Simon immediately moved forward and had leapt up to 19th by start of lap 9. A lap later this was 18th and, lapping three tenths of a second quicker than what he had done in qualifying, he climbed even further up to 17th with two laps to go. Sadly, the gap to the 15th place man was too large to make up in the final two laps and Simon had to settle for his 17th place position although he was more than happy with getting a strong ride and race under his belt after the non-finishes of Thruxton and Oulton.

Speaking afterwards, despite being in pain, it was a pleased Simon that said: "To be honest, I'm really happy with how the weekend's gone and it's nice to have had a troublefree time with the bike and it's ran really well over all three days. The speed is really good now and we were consistently in the top ten through the speedtraps whilst I was also able to get quicker and quicker all weekend. The new clutch we fitted was absolutely superb and allowed me to make an even better start than usual so when I was up to 14th on the first lap, things were looking really good. Coming out of the hairpin though the bike highsided me and how I stayed on I'll never know although it did cause me to run off the track and get hit by another rider. I knew something had happened to my leg straightaway and so was in a lot of pain for the rest of the race but I dug deep and kept picking them off one by one. A couple of riders in front of me also crashed which allowed me to move up another couple of places but to finish 17th after what happened on the first lap is pleasing. It's also a bit frustrating as if that hadn't have happened, I think 12th place could have been the end result. What with the heat as well, today has definitely been the hardest race I've ever had but luckily the bone is only cracked rather than broken and we've got a good break before the next round so we should be 100% for then."

The series now has a 5-week break with the next round taking place at Mallory Park, Leicestershire over the weekend of June 25-27.

Picture by Glynne Lewis

Phil Wain
Freelance PR

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