But Sunday came and brought really bad rain so the riding conditions were horrendous. I had to start at the back of the grid in race one because there was a problem with my bike so I wasn’t able to make it out for the sighting lap. I ended up on the outside going into the first corner and there was so much spray that everyone sat up and unfortunately I was a casualty of the mayhem, was punted off into the gravel and the bike just dug in. I got a great start in race two and was up in 14th after four laps, but then my engine locked up so I had to pull in. We were in garage 13 again at Assen and clearly, changing it to 12A clearly made no difference to my luck that weekend either!
But finally, at last weekend’s race at Lausitzring the number 13 finally gave me some good fortune when I finished the second race in 13th and scored my first championship points. It was a fantastic feeling and what everyone in the team deserved. My aim was to finish in the top fifteen and I’d have been happy with one point so getting three was a great bonus. I knew someone was catching me towards the end but I just pushed myself and the bike really hard as there was no way I was going to let those points go.
Whilst niggling problems have hampered my results on track throughout the year, I can only take encouragement from the fact that I’ve made strides forward with my bike set up and superbike experience and have consistently managed to improve my lap times and riding performance on the FP1. Hopefully this, along with more technically trouble free race weekends, will continue for the final two rounds of the season so that we can finish the season and PETRONAS project on a high and can keep myself in the shop window for next season as I want to stay in World Superbikes and prove what I can do.
Until next time....
Craig
