CEV: Aragon Race

The race day at the Motorland Circuit in Aragon Spain for Round 2 of the CEV finally saw a day without the high winds that had dogged the practice and qualifying sessions.

Brad had only been able to gain, for him, a rather lowly 26^thplace on the grid aboard the Larresport Honda and his warm-up pace was hampered by rather worn tyres and he improved only marginally over his previous times.

With the race now starting in near perfect weather conditions, his best hope was to try for a good start and get through to as high a position as possible, something that is not so easy but occasionally aided by others misfortune, crashes or machine failure. Things went partially to plan as at the end of lap one he had made 6 places, but from then on it was a lap by lap improvement that saw him at one time through to 15th place only to lose 2 places on last few laps and drop to a non points scoring 17^th. All his race lap times were better than qualifying and he set his fastest lap on the last lap trying to get back that 15^thplace. Some consolation was to be gained from the fact that he was one of the highest placed Honda machines with KTM dominating the front end of the field.

The next round is at the Albacete circuit onthe 21^stto 26^thJuneso a bit of a wait. Fortunately Albacete is a circuit not endowed with very fast straights so perhaps that will level things a little for the Hondas.

CEV: Aragon Qualifying

For Brad Ray, this CEV round at the Spanish Motorland circuit in Aragon has so far, had very mixed fortunes. The weather for both days has been dry but very windy making riding conditions very tricky at times. Both of Friday's practice sessions were difficult, 12 laps spent running in a spare motor and any following laps hampered by an intermittent ignition problem, finally located to a faulty "crash sensor" in session one and then a suspected cam chain failure on the first lap of the second session. Certainly not a good day at the office.

Saturday's official qualifying sessions saw the motor he used at the previous round back in the bike. These would be his first "all out" sessions of the weekend and the Aragon circuit is not forgiving of lack of practice and this was certainly brought home with Brad in 24th place in Q1 and, despite going quicker in Q2, it drops him to 26th on the grid for the race. he will have to be get the best start possible and go for it tomorrow to be able to keep scoring the points.

"The bike is running fine, I just have to get myself into gear. I'm not used to being that far down and struggling" he commented on the situation.

We have to look forward to see if he can pull something out of the bag for the race.

Jerez MotoGP Rookies Race

A reasonable weekend for Brad, but not exceptional with an 8^th in Race 1 and 6^th in Race 2. This still sees Brad sitting in 3^rd place in the Championship just 1 point behind second. Full report soon.

Next race is the CEV with Team Larresport at Aragon on the 24^th / 25^th /26^th of May.

Another photo from the Red Bull MotoGP Rookies at the Spanish GP at Jerez de la Frontera last weekend. Just shows how manic these races are!! Brad is #28.

Brad Relaxing!

Brad Ray enjoys one on the non racing benefits of riding in the Red Bull MotoGP Rookies !! The arm pushing Brad even closer belongs to Taz MacKenzie. Marcos Ramirez doesn't look too unhappy either.