It was something of a disappointing end to the Pirelli National Superstock 1000 Championship season for Aaron Clarke over the weekend.
Kirton racer Clarke was deemed to have jumped at the start of the Brands Hatch race and was penalised – meaning he was only able to finish his race in 28th position in Sunday’s final round.
Clarke gave the free practice a miss as there was nothing to be gained on a damp track on Friday morning and a lot to lose if he were to crash in the sketchy conditions.
But the weather was much better for qualifying and he put his Yamaha R1 on the ninth row of the grid ahead of Sunday’s 14-lap race.
However, the race was red flagged on the opening lap for a crash and reduced to 11 laps for the restart.
Once under way again, Clarke got a good start and was up to 23rd place on lap four when he saw a board that said he had jumped the start and was to do a ride through penalty.
After completing his ride through the pit lane he rejoined the race dead last and well behind the rest of the riders.
But he got his head down and began to reel in the back markers, passing two on lap six and a further three one lap later to move into 30th place.
He then picked off one rider on each remaining lap to complete his race in 28th position.
Clarke said: “These things happen and you have to take the penalty. But for that I was looking at a decent result this weekend. It’s disappointing but it is what it is.
“I will regroup and come back next year to have another shot.”
Clarke started the year well scoring championship points in his first race after moving up from the Stock 600 championship.
But then his bike suffered an engine failure and he was forced to sit out half the season before making a comeback at Cadwell Park.
His best result since then has been a 16th place at Donington Park and he was anticipating a point scoring result at Brands Hatch, but it wasn’t to be.
- Ben Wilson ends his comeback season in the 2019 British Supersport championship in a creditable ninth place overall after taking a brace of 10th places in the final round at Brands Hatch last weekend.
After spending part of the season sidelined with a badly broken lower leg, Kirton racer Wilson has done remarkably well to maintain a top ten end to the campaign.
After qualifying for a start to the short sprint race on Saturday from a fifth row grid position, Wilson ran in 11th place in his class within the mixed grid of Supersport and GP2 riders and held 11th through the majority of the laps.
But on the final lap the race was red flagged and he was promoted to tenth in his class, 13th overall to pick up six championship points.
Once again starting from the fifth row, Wilson settled into tenth place in his class at the start of the 18-lap feature race on Sunday.
He remained in tenth place throughout to pick up another six points to bring his final total to 144 and clinch ninth in the championship.
