Supersport sees rather a destructive day.

A record weekend crowd of 126,000 crammed into Brands Hatch to witness a somewhat destructive Supersport race, eventually run over its full 23-lap
scheduled duration.

Supersport sees rather a destructive day.

A record weekend crowd of 126,000 crammed into Brands Hatch to witness a somewhat destructive Supersport race, eventually run over its full 23-lap
scheduled duration.

A crash on lap seven elicited the first appearance of
the red flags, after Stephane Chambon (Suzuki) fell at the base of Paddock Hill. A further accident on the first lap of the re-start saw the red flags put out to protect James Whitham, who suffered a high-speed fall from his R6, after high-siding on the exit of Clark Curve. Having not yet completed the lap, the field were not deemed to he started at all, and thus another start, over the remaining scheduled distance, was called.

Further drama meant that a final race-stopping crash, suffered by Fabien Foret (Honda), meant yet another start. The triple aggregate race gave a podium finish to Paolo Casoli (Yamaha Belgarda), who scored third place overall.

The race itself was won by Katsuaki Fujiwara (Suzuki), who ended up only 0.208 seconds clear of Foret. Yamaha Motor Germany riders J?rg Teuchert and Christian Kellner took fifth and sixth places, avoiding the problems in the race with some style.

The World Championship takes on a different form after the upsets of Brands, with Foret (138) now nine points clear of new second place man, Fujiwara
(129). Suzuki rider Stephane Chambon remains on 115 points, with fourth place rider Andrew Pitt, a no-scorer at brands, on 113. The highest-placed
Yamaha rider is Christian Kellner, fifth on 88 points.

Paolo Casoli gave his take on a difficult day: "It was difficult with three starts today. Each race I tried my best but it was so easy to make a mistake, as we saw from the other riders. Today I thought the conditions and the race were too hot for me and I was worried also for the bike that after three starts there would be too much strain on the clutch, but in the end it performed well."

J?rg Teuchert ended his day not in the best of minds: "I'm not very happy with that. In the first section I made a good start but was not aggressive enough through the first two corners and lost a lot of places. I did the same in the second start but in the third I was very aggressive. I had a small problem with my front brake, which was squashing my little finger when I was braking hard. I was able to adjust it and at the end of the race I started to find my form. Unfortunately by then the race was over. I usually come good at the end of the race, in the last five or ten laps, so today it was difficult for me."

Another to have a fraught time was Christian Kellner: "That was a crazy race, so many riders crashed and there were bikes in the middle of the track more than once. Doing three starts was tough on the bike and the race was more like three sprint races. The end position is so-so for me. I qualified eighth and finished sixth - but for the championship this is good because of the riders that crashed out."

For James Whitham there was a world of pain experienced at Brands: "That was a big crash and it hurt a lot! The only really bad injury is my dislocated and broken elbow," he explained. "I've made a bit of a mess of that actually. There is nothing I can do now except get it to heal as fast as I can, so I have booked myself in for an operation tomorrow in Huddersfield to get it pinned or plated. All I remember is the back end letting loose, flicking me back towards the inside barriers, and not much after that."

On his first visit to Brands Hatch privateer Allessio Corradi of Team Italia Sparado scored an impressive 7th place finish, his joint highest result this season. "It's a big result for me, especially as this is my first time racing here and I was racing with the top guys through the whole race. The team did a great job this weekend and my R6 ran very fast."

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