The ninth round of the Hel Performance Motostar British Championship took place at Cheshire’s Oulton Park circuit at the weekend. Puriton’s TJ Toms collected more valuable championship points.
Free Practice
In a very close 30 minute session TJ Toms completed eleven laps during the allotted time. His best saw him finish as the fifth quickest rider. However, the top five were split by less than 0.6 seconds.
In the second free practice session there was some light rain and the track was a bit greasy. Toms set a best time of 1:50.445 which would have seen him third fastest in the session. However, Toms made a practice start at the end of the session which breached the rules for free practice so his best time was deleted. A misunderstanding by Toms that wasn’t really costly as it was just free practice. His second best time of 1:50.532 had him classified as fourth quickest.
Qualifying
The first qualifying session took place first thing on Saturday morning. Unfortunately the forecasters were right and rain fell overnight leaving the Moto3 risers with a wet track. As Q2 was expected to be dry Q1 was of limited use so Toms wasn’t taking any risks. He completed 12 laps and finished 6th quickest.
The second qualifying was dry and Toms immediately set about setting a good lap time. He set his best time on his eleventh lap of the circuit recording a lap of 1:49.126 which saw him placed 4th in his class.
The Race
There is only one race at the Oulton Park rounds and it got underway at three o’clock in the afternoon. The weather was perfect for the 12 lap event. Toms dropped a place on the opening lap of the race, but it only took him until lap two to recovery the position. However, this meant the group ahead had already made a gap which Toms was unable to close. Although he was unable to catch the group of standard riders ahead of him he enjoyed a race long battle with a GP class rider in which he maintained the rider behind him all the way to the finish line. Toms crossed the line fourth in his class to collect another 13 championship points.
With his fourth place finish Toms now has 215 points and sits third in the standard class championship. The next round is at Donington Park on the 16 to 18 September.
TJ Toms said, “This weekend we only had one race so it was important to get some points. Having qualified fourth I lost a place on the first lap and the main group got away. However, I kept my focus by concentrating on keeping one of the GP class riders behind me. I finished the race in fourth and stayed third in the championship. We’ve got three more rounds to go. Thanks to my Gary Wilson for the bike, and also my sponsors, Warren Bright Racing Foundation, Swindon Karting, SRC Driver Training, SMW Limited, Skills Direct, Munchkins Catering, K&B Motors, Johnson Metals, Oxford products, Daytona Boots, Auritech, MustHaveMediaServices.com and my Grandad who helps fund my racing.”