Sendo Ducati Dienza’s Brands Hatch BSB report

Pic: Chris Martin
By Carly Rathmell
June 22 2004

Dean Thomas had a disappointing weekend at round seven of the Think! British Superbike Championship yesterday (20th June). The 31 year-old Leeds rider suffered mixed fortunes at the Kent track and could only salvage 10th place in the opening race.

picture by Chris Martin @ www.brakingzone.com

It was a varied weekend for the Australian and the Sendo Ducati team - and a weekend that they are looking to move on from. As weather conditions progressively deteriorated throughout the weekend, it was a tough decision on tyre choices.

Thomas only managed to qualify in 7th place for the two races on Sunday - after getting held up (whilst on his last set of qualifying tyres) by Suzuki Rider Yukio Kagayama. Race day started badly for Thomas, as a big crash in the morning warm up proved painful for the Aussie. A huge high-side resulted in Thomas landing on his hands and knees. His shins soon began to swell as he arrived back in the garage.

Feeling a bit battered and bruised at the start of the first race, Thomas was keen to produce a confident ride and a healthy result to boost his Championship standings. Weather conditions for the first race were mixed, which is the worst possible scenario for racers: part of the track was dry and part wet. Thomas slipped back through the field from the start and fell back to 12th place. Fighting hard, he managed to regain two places and brought his 998 Ducati home safely in 10th.

Conditions continued to worsen for the second race, but Thomas took the risk of using a cut slick - hoping that track conditions would dry out throughout the race. This was not to be the case however and the rainfall increased. Poor grip on the start line pushed Thomas towards the back of the pack. As he tried to force his way back through the field, a technical problem forced him to retire with five laps remaining.

Commenting, Thomas said: “Well what can I say, it’s been one of those weekends that you wish hadn’t happened. Things seemed to have gone from bad to worse. With my crash this morning I destroyed the bike, which I’d been using all weekend and the weather conditions proved a complete nightmare. I want to put this weekend to the back of my mind and move on very quickly to Knockhill in a couple of weeks time. My shins are a bit sore as I landed pretty heavily on them when I crashed earlier. They are a bit swollen but I’ll be back and confident when we head to Scotland.”

Cont…


Race One Result

Reynolds 33:42.324
Emmett 33:47.885
McGuinness 33:47.989
Kagayama 33:49.555
Rutter 33:52.555
Haydon 33.55.060
Hill 33:55.115
Haslam 33:59.166
Corke 34:03.393
Thomas 34:05.214

Race Two Result

Haslam 32:19.096
Emmett 32:24.672
Kagayama 32:26.370
Haydon 32.27.906
Smart 32.28.734
McGuinness 32:29.570
Reynolds 32:36.574
Hill 32:37.218
Coxhell 32:41.261

Championship Standings after Round 7

Reynolds 261
Rutter 232
Emmett 186
Kagayama 181
Smart 164
Thomas 101
Hill 88
Kiyonari 87
Richards 78
Mason 64