‘Max Thrives at 1st Round of BSB at Silverstone’
Last year Max made the step up from the FAB-Racing Junior British Championship, which races on National Go-kart circuits, to the Aprilia Superteen Championship which was his 1st taste of big bike racing on big circuits. Last year Max rode historic circuits like Brands Hatch and Donington Park, but despite competing in 20 races, in 2 championships, he never got to ride Silverstone, much to his disappointment. However it all changed this weekend as Max could tick off Silverstone GP Circuit from his list and experience the same stretch of tarmac as the MotoGP riders have in the last few years.
There was a mixture of nerves and excitement going into the 1st round as Max was really looking forward to being re-united with the team and getting back on the moto3, but there were also lots of unknowns, like the circuit, level of competition and riding in front of lots of spectators (plus Live television). This was all new to Max, but he dealt with it in his typical laid back and professional manner. Max also had his mentor, coach and friend, Danny Webb (Ex-professional GP rider and Isle of Man TT rider) with him this weekend for support.
With all things considered, the objective for Max was to have a solid weekend, enjoy the experience, learn the circuit, place top 15 and achieve a dry lap-time of 2:25sec – 2:26sec.
Practice Session
Practice was on Friday morning and the conditions were not ideal. The track had been closed for some time due to oil spillage, it was wet and cold. Max managed 2 laps before a culmination of track conditions, bike and rider inexperience resulted in a highside crash at Stow. Max was ok and the bike suffered minor damage, but it was disappointing as Max needed to learn the circuit and track time was precious because the next session went straight into Qualifying!
Qualifying 1
With the bike back together and conditions improving, Max went out for his 1st of 2 qualifying sessions on Friday afternoon. The track was dry and bike felt good, Max upped his pace and started learning the circuit. The best lap-time he could achieve was a 2:29s which put him in 35th out of 47 riders. Sadly the lack of laps from practice meant Max didn’t learn circuit and put him on the back foot. However the positives were; max did learn the circuit quickly and the team had good usable data, which meant everyone was positive a significant improvement would be found in second qualifying session the next day.
Qualifying 2
Going to bed the previous night Max felt confident he would wake to a dry day – sadly this was wrong as the heavens opened early in the morning which meant the second qualifying session was wet! None of the riders on track could improve their times from the Friday, so the grid for Race 1 in afternoon remained the same. The good news for Max was he placed 21st out of 47 riders in that session and was immediately comfortable on the Dunlop Wets that he had never ridden before.
RACE 1 (8 laps)
For Race 1 Max was 35th on grid, which put him 13 rows back from the front. The conditions were still wet, but the rain had stopped. Taking advice from the Danny and the team, Max just needed more laps, finish the race and improve his grid position.
When the lights went out Max had a great start and immediately made up 5 positions by the 1st corner. By lap 3 Max had made up a further 5 places to 24th. Max continued to push and the lap-times began to tumble. By lap 6 Max was in 20th and hunting down a group of riders ahead of him. As the track dried Max was able to pass the group of riders ahead of him into 17th position. On the last lap the rider ahead of him fell at the last corner which gave Max an overall placing of 16th out of 47 riders. However, because the Northern European Moto3 Championship were sharing the BSB race, the riders in that class were removed from the BSB result which meant that Max actually finished in 12th position and secured him 4 valuable championship points.
Max was so happy after this race as he felt competitive and it was so much fun overtaking and battling through the field. After the race Max spent lots of time with Danny and the team going through the race, bike telemetry, circuit etc and were very confident that between Max and the Bike more could be found for the second race the following day.
RACE 2
What a difference a day makes! Sunday brought out the fans and spectators. After finding his mojo on the bike and feeling confident Max was excited to race in front a few thousand people. His grid position had also improved from his race yesterday and he was on Row 6 in 16th place.
Again Max got a good start and ran with the leading group of riders for the 1st few corners. Max was then avoiding falling riders as 6 riders fell in front of Max, which propelled him to 11th place after the 1st lap. Max was in a group of 3-4 riders for a few laps and his lap times improved lap on lap which enabled him to pull away, which put him into 8th place overall. Max continued to push throughout the race, despite being on his own, and managed to achieve a brilliant lap-time of 2:24s which was better than his target for weekend. At the end of the race he finished 8th overall and when the Northern European Moto3 class were removed it placed Max in a fantastic 6th place.
With both races combined Max is joint 8th in the BSB Championship. For Max to place this highly after his 1st race weekend in the class, at an unknown circuit with tricky conditions, was simply outstanding and shows the potential Max has.
Max:“At the moment I feel absolutely brilliant. After a tough start to the weekend I thought I’d do well to come away with a couple of points, but to come away in the top 10 and have 14 points is awesome. During the races I just wanted to get my head down and do my best, but enjoy it as well. The circuit was new to me and to begin with was pretty scary, as most of the corners are really fast and I’ve never ridden a circuit like it, but once I got used to it I absolutely loved it, especially in the dry. I’m looking forward to seeing MotoGP here later this year as I sort of know what they have to deal with.
The bike was awesome all weekend and Gary, Stefan, Trick and Andy from Kais Suspension did a great job improving it over weekend and fixing it for me when I crashed on Friday, so a massive thanks to them. It was awesome having Danny with me this weekend, he taught me so much and gave me more confidence, so a huge thanks to him as well”
Overall this was an amazing 1st round, which is a solid start to start building for the remainder of year.
A huge thank you to all of Max sponsors for help and continued support for this season.
Stay tuned for more as we cover Max's racing season! Well done Max, and good luck for the next round.
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All the best
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