Victor Cox put the disappointment of Brands Hatch behind him with an
eighth place finish in Round 9 of the Metzeler National Superstock
1000cc Championship at Cadwell Park on Bank Holiday Monday.First qualifying saw Cox uncharacteristically down in tenth place, although the Trowbridge man was just over half a second off a place in the top six. It was a similar story in the second session as Victor again finished tenth, albeit with an improvement of almost a second on his best lap time with only a second covering the top 12 riders.
So Cox lined up on the fourth row of the grid and as the riders completed their first lap he was up to seventh, 2.74s down on the leader and one second behind sixth place man Luke Quigley. Victor in turn was at the front of a three man group which also included Tristan Palmer and David Johnson. He determinedly held on to seventh for the first four laps as Palmer and Johnson juggled positions, but on the fifth lap Palmer got ahead to demote him to eighth as Johnson began to fade with Billy Mellor now up to ninth. Victor circulated in a safe eighth for the next couple of laps, almost a second behind Palmer who, on the eighth lap got ahead of Howie Mainwaring to move into sixth.
At this point Cox was almost a second clear in eighth with Mainwaring a similar distance ahead of him, but two laps later the gap between the two had lessened considerably as Victor began to assert some serious pressure on his rival in front. As they crossed the line at the end of Lap 11, Cox was right with Mainwaring and on the next lap he got ahead of him to move into seventh, however Anthony Haywood's crash brought an early end to proceedings and a result was declared from the previous lap leaving Victor in eighth.
It was nevertheless a gutsy ride from Cox who climbed back up the championship table to ninth.
Conor Cummins meanwhile came so close yet so far to scoring points once more when the Manx rider finished in 19th place at Cadwell Park. The Blackhorse Kawasaki rider put in his best qualifying performance of the season and was more than confident of scoring points but he fell victim to severe arm pump and gradually slipped back through the pack after starting the race strongly.
The undulating Lincolnshire circuit was always going to be a tough circuit for Conor due to its physical nature but after a steady opening qualifying session on Saturday, Conor showed how much he's improved in recent weeks with a fine effort in the final session on Sunday. Indeed, a time of 1m32.40s saw him take 1.2s off his previous best time and it elevated him up to a strong 16th on the grid.
Conditions on Monday were good and a solid start saw Conor maintain his 16th place starting position and here he remained for the first 4 laps as he battled with fellow Manxman Gavin Hunt and Daniel Johnson for the final Championship points. Just after half race distance though, Conor began to run into trouble as his arm severely 'pumped up' and he was powerless to do anything about it as a number of riders overtook him. With a third of the race still to run, Conor found himself back in 19th and with the red flag coming out early, this was his finishing position.
Speaking afterwards, Conor said; "Without wishing to sound like I'm repeating myself, it's been another frustrating race for me as I felt really confident after qualifying that I was going to score some points this weekend. This was the one place where I thought I may struggle with my injuries but that wasn't the case at all and during both free practice and qualifying I felt really good. We worked really hard on getting the handling right in time for final qualifying and it worked a treat so I had the confidence to have a real good go."
"It was comfortably my best qualifying performance of the year so I felt good for Monday's race and was desperate to get into the points. I got a decent start to the race and was just sitting with the pack but then, for the first time in my career, I got arm pump and my forearm was literally solid so there was nothing I could do and gradually slipped back. All I can think of was what I was overcompensating a bit and using my arms too much to muscle the bike through all the changes in direction. Cadwell is probably the hardest circuit on the body but there are again positives to take out of the weekend and we're continually chipping away both with the bike and with my riding so we're definitely getting there. I'm really happy with the bike now so a big thanks to the team for all their work whilst I've again taken a stride forward as shown in qualifying. If we can just piece everything together in the final three rounds, I'm sure all our hard work will be rewarded with some good points scoring finishes."
Photos Courtesy:
Clive Challinor Motorsport Photography