BSB moved to the country’s fastest circuit, Thruxton in Hampshire, for the second weekend of August and with it came tropical conditions. Painter’s Forstal resident Finn Smart-Weeden (aka FatBoyFinn) went to round six of the Pirelli National SportBike championship in eleventh place and looking to improve.

Despite overnight rain the track was dry for the first free practice session of the event and Finn finished in 12th place four and a half seconds off the top but generally improving his times every lap. 

Similar but hotter conditions prevailed for the afternoon practice and Finn improved again – taking two seconds off to end the session in tenth place and only two seconds off the top spot. The practice sessions combined timings placed him tenth overall.  

The Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School sixth form student struggled to find a decent slipstream on this fast flowing 2.3 mile circuit in Saturday morning’s qualifying, seeing Finn unable to get a decent lap, only achieving twelfth for the first race starting grid.

Race one, the penultimate race on Saturday evening,  was reduced from fourteen laps to twelve due to time constraints imposed by red flags in previous races.

Finn got a good start moving up in 10th place in the first lap and ninth place for laps three to nine although a two second penalty applied in lap eight, for cutting the last chicane in lap four, put him in eleventh place on adjusted times.

Due to confusions on the pitboard and the late application of the penalty, Finn was unaware that he could do no better nor worse than eleventh as the twelfth placed rider was more than nine seconds behind but continued to push and crashed at the first chicane on the last lap. So, no points but his best race lap time put him up to ninth for race two’s starting grid.

The Kent rider had sustained some damage to the right side of his bike in race one’s crash and the team were up late repairing the fairings, exhaust and crash protection. A further, intermittent, problem, resulting from Saturday’s crash, showed up in Sunday’s early morning warm up session when Finn failed to complete a lap due to a broken throttle twist grip. Luckily, Sunday’s race was scheduled as the last race of the day as new parts had to be sourced to make the repair and get Finn out to compete.

Sundays fourteen lap race was red-flagged in the first lap due to two fallers at the last chicane and was restarted and reduced to twelve laps. Finn dropped to tenth in the first lap but regained ninth by lap three where he remained for most of the race, crossing the line in sixth after carnage on the last lap at the last chicane saw three of the front riders go down when one of them made a mistake. Finn’s sixth place finish saw Finn retain eleventh in the championship and only 12 points behind ninth with five races to go.

Next up is Cadwell Park in Lincolnshire over the bank holiday weekend; one of Finn’s favourite tracks and the first time he will race there with BSB having won over ten club races in previous years at this ‘mountain’ circuit.

Speaking after the weekend, Finn said: “I was really annoyed to crash out in race one, it was my own fault; I was trying too hard and didn’t realise the course cut penalty meant there was no point and I could have backed off and still come eleventh which would have seen me take tenth overall in the championship.

“However, I know I was racing well so I’ll take the positives. Cadwell Park is one of my favourite tracks but I’ve only ever raced there at club level championships so I’m looking forward to my first BSB outing there.”

Images courtesy of:

Picture 1: Photo credit Photostrada

Picture 2; photo credit Glyns’s photos

Picture 3: photo credit Alastair Ladd Photography