First round disappointment for Shand at Brands

Scotland's Les Shand had a disappointing weekend at Brands Hatch, in the opening round of the National Superstock Championship, finishing in a lowly 23rd place. The 30-year old had only taken delivery of his Honda Fireblade two weeks prior to the meeting and it showed as he struggled over the course of the two days with the new machine, mainly with a lack of top speed. However, he was able to put together a string of consistent race laps, comparable to many of the top ten runners, and is subsequently feeling hopeful for the rest of the season, having gained valuable information and knowledge.

The two qualifying sessions were held in dry and wet conditions, and Les finished 19th in his group in the dry with a time of 49.536secs and 10th in the wet. With new regulations coming into play, the grid was formed from the top 19 riders from each group, rather than on overall times, so this meant Les would line up in 37th place and on the final row. Still learning the bike, the team worked on the fuel mapping and exhaust system overnight and the changes improved the bike in the morning warm up. A clean start saw Les move up to 33rd at the opening lap, a position that didn't change until lap 8. From here on in, Shand began to make inroads into the riders in front of him and gradually moved up the leaderboard. Proof of how well he was riding could be seen in his best lap time of 48.842secs, almost three quarters of a second quicker than his qualifying time, which was comparable to the pace riders inside the top ten were lapping at and this played a large part in his final placing of 23rd. Having finished 6th overall in the championship in 2005, this was definitely not what he had hoped for but given the circumstances it was a solid finish.

After finishing the 26-lap race, Les said:

"If you're 37th on the grid, you're never going to finish in the top ten of a Superstock race so I knew after qualifying that the race was going to be a riding exercise. I got a reasonable start and managed to pick off a few other riders so I was generally satisfied with the way I rode. When you start that far back, there's little point in going on a 'do or die' mission and the last thing I wanted was to be travelling home with a crashed bike. I used the race to familiarise myself with the Honda and get my brain back up to speed so at least I brought the bike home in one piece and know what I've got to do for the next round."

"It's been very difficult to get all the right parts for the machine and I was still building the bike just before free practice. It was also the first time I've been on a race bike since Macau last November and you can't expect to jump on the bike after 4 months and be as fast as all those riders who've done hundreds of miles of pre-season testing. Having said that, we qualified and ran a strong race, lapping only a tenth of a second slower than the leading Honda, and now know what areas of the bike we need to improve before Donington. We've gained an awful lot of information and knowledge about the bike and I'm very confident that I'll put on a much stronger showing when we get there. And I'm still the lap record holder on the Brands Indy circuit so at least that's something!"

The second round of the National Superstock Championship takes place at Donington Park on the weekend of 7-9 April.