Bradley ‘The Milky Bar Kid’ Ray takes two wins and sets a new lap
record
After the frustration of not making the podium at his home
Grand Prix the previous weekend at Silverstone, Lydd’s Bradley Ray didn’t have
long to dust himself down and head to round nine of the Motul British Motostar
Championship at the famous Donington Park circuit.
After a change to the normal schedule due to the
cancellation of the round eight race of the Championship at Cadwell Park, the
weekend saw an extra ten minutes on each free practice and qualifying session
with the replacement race on Saturday afternoon using the grid positions
achieved at Cadwell Park. On the morning of the first free practice session the
weather was overcast, but that didn’t dampen the spirits of Brad, who in free
practice one topped the 125cc class by half a second.
After fitting a “refreshed” engine during the break between
sessions to give Brad more power, he dipped under the lap record of the 2.4-mile
circuit by a full second, posting a 1:38.074 lap, just a tenth of a second
behind session topper and the 250cc Moto3 of Joe Irving.
During qualifying on Saturday morning for Sunday’s race,
Brad destroyed the lap record once again, posting a 1.37.9 lap, once again just
fractionally down on Irving's 250cc Moto3 time.
The postponed Saturday afternoon “Cadwell” race start saw Brad take the hole shot that
shortly after developed into a battle with the hard charging Irving and,
despite setting a new 125cc lap record at 1:37.5 on lap nine and challenging
for the lead many times, Brad took the flag in second position just 0.3 seconds
behind Irving but more importantly
taking the top step of the 125 podium.
With the sun shining on the circuit for the eight minute
warm up on Sunday Brad finished feeling confident of taking the 125cc double
win. At the start of the mid afternoon
race with the sun still shining, Brad once again had a great start but had to
settle for a great second place battle with Jordon Weaving as race leader Joe
Irving took off into the distance before crashing heavily at the Melboune Loop
on lap eight. Getting the better of
Weaving Brad ‘The Bard’ pulled out a comfortable three and a half second lead
to cross the line first overall and first 125cc, a great Donington Park
double.
After the race a delighted Brad said: “Saturday’s race was
quite tough, I tried to get the overall win, but missed out and took the 125
win, so that was pretty good. Today, Joe (Irving) pulled away so I concentrated
on the 125 win, but then Joe crashed and I dropped Jordan by three seconds and
just kept the gap till the end, so it was a good weekend.”
Brad now moves into third place of the Motul British
Motostar 125GP Championship on 116 points, only 13 behind second place man Taz
Taylor with three rounds of the Championship remaining.
Brad’s busy schedule doesn’t stop here, with a turn round of
just one week before he jets off to the Grand Prix of San Marino for round 12 of the Red Bull MotoGP Rookies Cup, a round in
which he is looking ahead too. “Its going to be a tough weekend, there is a
nice long straight and with the speed issues I have its going to make for a
interesting race.”
Photography By:
Words:
Michael Burton
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