SPLITLATH Motorsport’s Hudson Kennaugh scored a 17th place finish in a wet Race One at Thruxton today.

The South African rider has now dashed across the pond to the Isle of Man to take part in tonight’s first practice session for the famous TT event.

Kennaugh was flying solo as the team’s only rider as the MCE Insurance British Superbike Championship arrived at the Hampshire circuit for the weekend.

After a difficult start, he eventually qualified his Aprilia RSV4 machine in 29th position in the dry on Sunday.

But the weather changed overnight, and as the rain hit the circuit this morning it soon became clear that all of today’s races would be wet.

At the start he got a clean getaway, and had made up several spots as the pack crossed the line at the end of the first lap. From there he put his head down and continued to push hard, picking off a number of riders to eventually finish the race 17th.

After the Race One result, hopes were high that he could get a top 15 in the second, but as the rain continued to fall, he was forced to retire from the race when his visor misted and hampered his visibility.

“I think 17th is okay, and it’s clear that the rain is a good leveller,” he said. “It’s been a hard weekend so I was happy to get a top 20 finish. It was unfortunate we couldn’t stay out there in Race Two, but we’ve got to take what we can from the results we have and move on. I’m off to the TT now and I’m hoping we can get some good results out there.”


Team Manager John Dimbylow added:

“It was a shame we couldn’t get two results out there today, but Hudson did a good job in the first race. To come home 17th after starting 29th is great.

“The team have worked tirelessly this weekend. The boys were working on the bikes until midnight on Saturday night, and I have to thank them all for the fantastic job they have done. We are now getting ready for the TT which starts this evening, and then we’ll look ahead to Knockhill to see if we can build on our results here at Thruxton.”