HM Plant Honda’s Josh Brookes qualified on the front row in fourth for this weekend’s double-header round of the National Superstock 1000 Championship on the all-new Silverstone Arena circuit, following this afternoon’s two qualifying sessions at the British round of the MotoGP World Championship.

Practice got underway in dry conditions and in the opening session of the day, Josh clocked a time of 2m 13.127s to finish second fastest, just 0.063s adrift of fellow Honda rider Glen Richards.

However, in the afternoon conditions changed and back on the all-new Arena circuit Josh topped the times in the wet to lead nearest rival Michael Rutter by an impressive 1.520s. In the final session, Josh improved his lap time to maintain his position at the top of the times, before he crashed at Copse, but was able to return to the pits.

The session was halted when Matthew Norman crashed and, when the bikes returned to the track the HM Plant Honda team had got Josh back on circuit. Despite being in contention for the first-ever pole position on the new circuit he got nudged to fourth in the closing stages but will start tomorrow’s opening race from the front row.

Josh said:

“It took a few laps to get used to the Superstock bike and it feels really raw compared to the Superbike, and also to learn the new track, so there were quite a few unknowns for me. I stayed out the whole of the first 25 minute session and was leading until that last lap that Glen put in, but I was happy enough with that. Then the rain came in and we made some small changes and the HM Plant Honda Fireblade felt perfect. Michael (Rutter) closed up quite a lot but I still had a good gap. The next session was more slippery and we didn’t change anything, but I did a good lap to improve and the next thing I was on the ground; I just high-sided it but I was able to pick it up and I went back to the pits as I had put a hole through my gloves. The bike wasn’t badly damaged thankfully so I carried on but then there was the red flag that gave us the chance to fix the bike properly. I never got back into the rhythm after that but a front row start was ok; it is the races that are important.”

Josh’s’ BSB Crew Chief, Chris Pike, commented:

“We have never run on this circuit before and Josh hadn’t ridden the HM Plant Honda Superstock machine before, so it was encouraging to see we were competitive in both wet and dry conditions from the start. It was disappointing to have had a crash, but we will still be starting from the front row and we are happy with our race pace so we are looking good for the races.”