COVERAGE BY GORDON WILLIAMS
BRITISH Superbike rider Charlie Nesbitt won the prestigious Sunflower Trophy for the second year running with victory in the feature race of the weekend at the Bishopscourt meeting.
English visitor Nesbitt, riding a MasterMac Honda, was pursued very closely during Saturday’s main event by David Allingham. Richard Kerr held third place for the race distance but was being closed down by Scott Swann. Ballynahinch rider Korie McGreevey retired on lap three while holding fifth place and Barry Burrell worked his way up the field, from eighth on the opening lap to fifth place, while Jamie Lyons was up from 13th to sixth place on lap 10.
At the flag Nesbitt won by 1.306 of a second from Allingham, Kerr just held off a fast finishing Swann to take third place and Burrell remained in fifth with Lyons sixth.
The opening Superbike race on Friday saw Swann take the Honda into an early lead in very wet and windy conditions. Nesbitt established himself in second but by lap three that place belonged to McGreevey followed by Richard Cooper with Nesbitt down to fourth.
On lap seven of 10 Swann still led from McGreevey with Nesbitt closing now up to third place after passing Cooper. At the flag Swann took the win with Nesbitt second and McGreevey third just ahead of Cooper in fourth. Allingham finished fifth and Burrell was sixth.
Nesbitt won the second Superbike race on Saturday, taking the lead on lap four from early leaders Swann and Kerr. He was chased all the way to the flag by McGreevey who finished second and Kerr came home third in front of Swann, Allingham and Ross Irwin.
Swann won the final Superbike race of the weekend which was for the Jim Finlay Trophy, leading from the start from Kerr, Nesbitt and Allingham. By mid-race Swann looked in a comfortable lead but Nebitt began to up the pace passing Kerr into second place and close on the leader.
Such was the pace of Nesbitt he broke the outright track record with a speed of 100.877mph, but Swann managed to hold on and win by a mere 0.093 of a second. Kerr was third, Ryan Gibson fourth, Burrell fifth and Irwin sixth.
Richard Cooper made it a Supersport hat-trick for the BPE by Russell Racing Yamaha team. He won the first race from teammate Mike Brown with Marc Conlin third and McGreevey fourth.
In race two Cooper won from Owen Jenner with Brown third and McGreevey fourth. Cameron Dawson was fifth and Christian Elkin sixth. Cooper made it three out of three with victory in the final Supersport race, where Jenner finished second, Brown third and Dawson fourth.
The first of the combined Supertwin/Pre Injection races went to Jenner, who took the lead on the penultimate lap and ended up winning by 0.111 of a second from Cooper and Irwin.
Cooper took race two from Jenner with Irwin third, Gary McCoy fourth, Graham McAleese fifth and Robert Waddell sixth.
Robert Mark won both Moto1 races, beating Joey Hennassy and Buster Sherman Boyd in race one and Hennessy and Hubert Tomaszewski in race two.
Corey Barron won both combined Superbike and Supersport Cup races on the Mad Bros Suzuki, the combined Moto 3 and Lightweight Supersport races were won by Alexander Rowan and Jack Burrows, while visitors Sam and Jack Laidlaw won all three sidecar races over the weekend.