Kennedy victorious at Brands Hatch
Half way through the season and we turned up and Brands with a bike that had won the previous race after our appeal was upheld and awarded the win, this making it MV Agusta’s first ever win in British Supersport so a nice piece of history.
The decision was upheld due to Andrew Irwin passing on a yellow flag, not the best way of getting the first win however the points at the end of the season may account for the championship win.
Round 6 was arrived at Brands very confident we would do well as the team have been working on the bike for the last few weeks trying to better the bikes performance for Jack to maximise.
Free practise and qualifying went to plan and we secured 3rd on the grid for supersport which kept us in contact with the riders around us in the championship.
Race 1 saw the weather change and a choice of tyres was going to be crucial, we chose the tyres and it started to rain as the three minute board came out and we had to go with what we have.
The tyre choice did work for some other riders however it didn't give jack the feeling he needed so sensibly he nursed the bike home and secured more points towards the championship challenge. The lap time from race 1 did mean we started 12th on the grid for the feature race however we had great pace in the dry from morning warm up on old tyres and we were sure that we could push and try to get to the podium in the race.
Rain on the grid seems to be a feature of supersport for the past few years and this was going to be exception, as we got to the 3 minute board again the rain tried to upset the day however after a small delay by the organisers the weather cleared and we were ready to go.
Jack didn't get the best of starts however was aggressive and passing people as soon as he got to them over the first few laps and managed to fight his way to 4th by lap 6 and could see the front two. Once he passed Joe Francis he was able to gap him lap by lap and fully close in on the front pair who we are in the battle for the title with. As the laps went on all three riders matched each others lap times and a winner was difficult to pick, we the race entered its last lap there was a couple of passes but all the excitement came in the last few turns, first famer went passed Irwin which saw Jack slide up the inside of the gearlink Kawasaki and gain 2nd place, all three riders braked late in to the final turn however it was jack that kept hi line and was able to get the best drive out, the sprint to the finish was on and as all three crossed the line in a margin on 0.1 of a second we claimed our second win and we were able to share it with our sponsors who joined us on the day.
A great feeling and something we need to repeat to keep our championship challenge alive, now in third place in the championship 7 points of second and 33 points from the lead sees us go to Thruxton in a couple of weeks ready to challenge again.
Race report and image courtesy of MV Augusta Racing.