British Superbikes: Cadwell Park – Saturday Practice Results

Spread the love

The traditional August Bank Holiday race weekend brought the British Superbike Championship to Cadwell Park, and Saturday’s practice session delivered plenty of intrigue as the riders tuned up for qualifying. The standout of the day was reigning champion Kyle Ryde, who timed his run to perfection to top the timesheets and book himself a guaranteed spot in Q2.

Ryde, riding for Nitrous Competitions Racing Yamaha, executed a clever strategy during the session. For the majority of his laps he circulated on worn tyres, focusing on maintaining consistency and rhythm rather than outright speed — a deliberate approach designed to mirror the demands of the Superpole qualifying format, which makes its appearance this weekend at Cadwell. When he finally bolted on a fresh set, the pace immediately came. His blistering lap of 1m 25.497s not only placed him at the head of the order but was also quicker than the existing outright race lap record, though it just missed eclipsing the Superpole benchmark. With that lap complete, Ryde headed back to the pits, job done.

Behind him, Bradley Ray had been the pace-setter through much of the session thanks to his best FP2 time, and although he couldn’t quite hang onto top spot, the Raceways Yamaha rider was a mere 0.007s shy of Ryde. The battle between the Yamaha duo set the tone for what promises to be a fiercely contested weekend.

Breaking up the Yamaha lockout was Tommy Bridewell, who climbed to third for Honda Racing UK. Bridewell, competing at his team’s home circuit, gained two places compared with his earlier ranking in fifth, putting Honda firmly in the mix and giving the fans plenty to cheer about.

Further back, Charlie Nesbitt maintained his strong form by securing fourth for MasterMac Honda, another confidence-boosting showing. Scott Redding, meanwhile, overcame a difficult Friday — which included a big scare during testing at what has historically been a tough venue for him — by putting in a mammoth 38 laps. His perseverance paid off as the PBM Ducati rider lifted himself back into the top five, proving resilience counts at Cadwell’s notoriously tricky layout.

The test day on Friday had belonged to Leon Haslam, and the Moto Rapido Ducati rider continued to look sharp. With his metronomic consistency, Haslam slotted into sixth overall, the highest-placed Ducati in the standings.

Danny Kent, fresh from a double victory at Thruxton, endured a slower start to the weekend but still managed seventh for McAMS Yamaha, only 0.359s off Ryde’s benchmark. With the entire top ten covered by little more than half a second, the session underlined how close the field is heading into qualifying.

In eighth was Storm Stacey, who continues to impress on the Bathams AJN Racing BMW. Stacey found incremental gains throughout the session to lead the Bavarian brand’s charge. Behind him, Christian Iddon secured ninth spot after hovering on the cut-off point for much of the session. The AJN Steelstock Kawasaki rider delivered when it mattered to stay inside the crucial Q2 progression group.

Andrew Irwin rounded out the top ten on the second Honda Racing UK machine, just ahead of Rory Skinner on the Cheshire Mouldings Ducati and Glenn Irwin, who is making his first Cadwell appearance with the Nitrous Yamaha outfit. Glenn Irwin’s 12th-place run was enough to give him the final automatic Q2 berth.

Just missing out was Josh Brookes, who flirted with the top twelve but ultimately had to settle for 13th with the DAO Racing team. The same outfit fielded a returning Gabriele Giannini in 19th, deputising for the injured Lee Jackson.

The session ran relatively clean, with no crashes to report. However, both Jamie Davis and Luke Hedger were forced to pull off track with mechanical gremlins, underlining the technical challenge Cadwell’s undulating, narrow layout places on both rider and machine.