McGuinness bounces back into points.

In only his second meeting of the year for the Vitrans Honda team, John McGuinness made a welcome return to the points in the latest round of the Bennetts British Superbike Championship at Oulton Park.

McGuinness finished 15th and 16th in the two races to claim one championship point as he finished a BSB race for the first time since Mallory Park back in April.

After heavy rain showers blighted Friday's free practice sessions, Saturday dawned dry and bright and McGuinness ended the first qualifying session in an encouraging twelfth place. Conditions were better still for final qualifying, but although McGuinness improved his time he dropped to 14th place on the time-sheets.

Starting from the fourth row of the grid, McGuinness had a solid ride in the first race although he missed out on a point when he finished in 16th, just half a second behind Tristan Palmer who claimed the final championship point. Another decent start in the second race saw him running on the edge of the points and he eventually came home in 15th, just behind Richard Wren and Steve Brogan, to add one point more to his championship tally.

"Naturally, I'm a bit disappointed with the results as I would have liked to have been a lot higher but I've been away from racing for a long time and today's the first time I've finished a short circuit race since April so it's fair to say I'm a bit race rusty," he said afterwards. "Qualifying went reasonably well and I was pretty much on the pace but I got stuck in no mans land in both of the races and couldn't climb any higher.

"We chose a soft tyre for the first race and it was pretty much gone after eight laps. It was a battle to finish and I was quite tired at the end of the first race but we've made quite a bit of progress with the bike this weekend and I felt a lot better in the second race. I must admit I was hoping for rain today as it would have given me a better chance but I tried hard in both races, right until the very end, and I think we should be a bit higher up at Donington. The team was happy and I'm looking forward to Scarborough [where he competes in the International Gold Cup races this coming weekend] where it would be nice to pay them back. It's always a good meeting and hopefully Robbie and all the team will enjoy themselves."