Birthday boy Kyle closes gap at the top

Jacksdale’s birthday boy Kyle Reid closed the gap on championship leader Andy Reid with his second win of the summer in the latest round of the 600cc British Superstock Championship at Brands Hatch.

The previous weekend, Kyle had taken to a pedal cycle to ride to Skegness in order to help raise some funds to sponsor his motorcycle racing exploits in the British Championship.

But back on his regular machine, Kyle closed the gap at the top to 24 points with eight rounds left after Reid ended the race in fifth.

Kyle was placed seventh in qualifying, which put him back on the third row of the grid for the race.

On race day he showed he meant business by putting in a 1.31.079 minute lap on the warm-up, which a day earlier in the qualifiers would have placed him on pole position for the race.

As the lights went out Kyle got a good start and by the end of lap one it was Ryde, Irwin, Reid, Pole-man Mackenzie and Anderson.

Irwin was the rider to start to give Kyle the most grief and took the lead for a spell, while his fellow Irishman Reid went backwards in the pack and was battling it out down in sixth position with Twyman and Mackenzie.

By half race distance Kyle was starting to take command of the race and was firmly back in control at the front, while earlier leader Irwin was now coming under intense pressure from Leicester rider Collier and former moto-cross rider Nick Anderson and this little battle group started to lose track of leader Ryde, who was now beginning to open a gap on this marauding bunch.

The birthday boy could smell his second race win of the season and was determined to hang on to his position. By lap 12 had a 1.4 second lead over second-placed Irwin, who had some scary moments during his battle with the other riders in the group.

As the chequered flag came out, a jubilant Kyle took the race win, followed by Joe Collier who eventually got the better of Irwin, with Anderson then Reid making up the top five.