Scott Redding “thinking about the long run” with second in final Snetterton BSB race

Scott Redding had picked up a win in the BSB sprint race earlier in the day at Snetterton in the Sprint, as the retirements and crashes decided the podium places behind.

The Hager PBM rider had not been keen to take on the lead, and that rang true at the start of the final race, where he was passed early by Max Cook after starting from pole position.

Speaking to British Superbikes after the race, he used the interview to explain why he was happy to sit behind on the Ducati:

“I felt good behind Max. Like, literally he pulled away from me but I was like, ‘no I’m good with that’, I’m fine. I’ll close the gap.

Closed the gap, got past him, but as I went for the move, I started to understand quickly that I didn’t have as much grip as I expected from the previous races.

Then I just had in offset of less grip. Like, I was losing the front a little bit more. I couldn’t turn the bike as well as I wanted to, so I was running wide.

So it was just a little bit everywhere, it’s adding up, and then, yeah, my weak point, turn six and seven.”

That sector of the track was where, once in front Kyle Ryde could quickly take chunks our of Redding, with the gap at one point over two seconds as the number 45 also had attention behind to manage late in the race from a resurgent Bradley Ray:

“That’s basically where Kyle was breaking me. I couldn’t do enough over the lap to bring that back without making more mistakes, so it was just one of those races where I kind of - the gap was growing and I thought ‘nah, I’ll just let him have this one because I ain’t going to pull it back without risking too much - and, you know, you got to think about the long run sometimes.”

Thinking of the championship became more of a concern as Ray drew ever nearer, with Redding shocked at the gap vanishing on his pit board, adding:

“I was just kind of doing mu rhythm and then, all of a sudden, I had Brad breathing down my neck with like two laps to go.

Out of nowhere, the gap was like 1.5 and then it was like, I thought I saw 0.8 and I was like, that’s the wrong pit board, and then like zero into the last lap and I was like, ‘oh, I don’t need this right now” = so I just defended everywhere because I know like after what happened today, he was probably quite ready to race again. So I just defended the best as possible.

Redding also picked up the most points over the round, earning him his second Race of Aces trophy, which he brought to the press conference:

“Managed to bring it home in second, got overall points, got this little bad boy, so yeah, happy with the weekend.”

Scott Redding now sits 17 points behind title leader Ryde after his points haul, next heading to BSB Brands Hatch over 17 -19 July.