Andrew Sennett from Tilney St Lawrence competed in round 8 of the National 600 Superstock championship at the Cadwell Park circuit over the Bank Holiday weekend.
Cadwell Park is near Louth in the Lincolnshire Wolds and the 2.17 mile parkland circuit has a variety of features that make it special including the famous mountain where the machines leave the ground spectacularly.
Andrew hadn’t ridden his Yamaha YZF-R6 since the round at Snetterton having missed the Oulton Park and Knockhill rounds through lack of funds and was eager to get back on the track. His first outing was on Saturday in the 30 minute free practice session where he had to gamble on gearing and machine set up as he hadn’t ridden the 600 at Cadwell before. The basic setting worked well with Andrew posting the 9th quickest time.
Later in the day came the first timed qualifying session where the time set would count for grid positioning and with the weather forecast to deteriorate by Sunday a good time was important. There were 53 competitors out for the session so a good lap was always going to be difficult with all the traffic but Andrew used his time on the track wisely and posted a time that was 10th quickest.
As predicted the weather forecast was right and overnight and early on Sunday morning there was heavy rain which caused the proceedings to be delayed.
When Andrew’s session was called later the track was beginning to dry and there was a drying racing line. Andrew was able to circulate with virtually the same lap times of his 1PstP time but was unable to improve and was only dropped two places to 12th overall which would be his grid position for the race on Bank Holiday Monday.
Monday dawned and the weather was fine for his 10 minute warm-up session during which he tried to solve the issues that he had with his setup and once again set the 12th quickest time. The Race itself was the second on the card for the day and started at 11.55am. Andrew made a good start from his 12th position which unfortunately was the 4th row of the grid not the normal third due to the narrow nature of the circuit; safety reasons dictated that the riders line up in 3 not the customary 4.
The first left had bend from the start caused Andrew some problems when another rider pushed Andrew out wide and caused him to go the long way round the outside and cost him some places. He worked hard to regain his position and with some hard moves made his way back up through the pack when the pace car was brought out so and incident could be dealt with. When racing resumed Andrew continued and held his position to finish the 14 lap race in 14th place and secure 2 very valuable championship points.
Andrew and Team Sennett are now looking forward to the next round which is to be held at Croft on 12th, 13th & 14th September.
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