2000 Season Review
  After investing in 2 pairs of spare wheels and wet weather tyres, so as not to be caught out in the rain as per 1999 season, plus expensive servicing and maintenance to the team’s transporter, finances were initially dented therefore the team decided to contest and concentrate only on one championship for 2000. SP Racing launched it’s season at the Ty-Croes circuit on the Isle of Anglesey at the end of April and the first two rounds of the Derby Phoenix club championship. With the majority of the grid of riders having restarted their season up to a month earlier Phil and Stu were playing catch up as they rehoned their race-craft after a six month lay-off. With the meeting taking place over 2 days Stu claimed two solid 5th positions on the Saturday and a 5th and 4th on the Sunday whilst Phil plagued with severe braking trouble claimed 6th, 7th, 9th and 11th. “Initially I was disappointed with my results but bearing in mind the problems I had with my brakes I think I did a good job staying in front of the rest of the field” said Phil.
 

The team considered this a good start to the season as it left Stu in 4th position in the championship going into round 3 at Mallory Park. Investigations were carried out to the breaking system of Phil’s machine but to no avail before morning practice so a decision was taken for Phil to withdraw from the meeting on safety grounds. Stu, brimming with confidence, took to the front row of the grid for race one. With lightning reflexes he grabbed the hole-shot and held a healthy lead by the end of the first lap. Second placed, and championship leader, Pete Whiteside set about clawing back the deficit and slipped by at the beginning of lap three uncovering the straight line speed deficit of Stu’s bike. Hanging on to his shirt tails Stu and Whiteside stretched their lead until on lap four at the ultra fast 115mph Gerrards corner Stu lost the front. Tumbling through the gravel trap Stu, with some luck on his side, picked himself up unhurt. The bike faired less well. With the second race fast approaching the team decided Stu’s bike was too badly damaged to repair in such short space of time but with Phil’s machine to hand began installing the front brake system from Stu’s bike. A change of racing number and the transformation was complete. Due to grid positions being determined by finishing order of race one Stu prepared for the daunting task of a seventh row start. The lights turned green and Stu had made up 20 positions by the end of lap 2. With championship points awarded down to 6th he set about reeling in the leading bunch in hope of rescuing some points from an otherwise disappointing day. Putting in some low 55 second remaining laps Stu snatched 6th and punched the air in delight as he crossed the finish line. “I’m dead pleased with that ride as I went quicker than in the first race and didn’t crash! You never quite know what a spill does to you mentally but it seems to have done me no harm.”

In the short break until the next round of the series at Cadwell Park Stu’s bike was resurrected and more race funds spent on curing Phil’s breaking problems but again to no avail. Again Phil withdrew on safety grounds and Stu lined up for each race as sole team member. He grabbed the hole-shot again on the first lap and lead until encountering gearbox problems exiting the Cadwell club circuit hairpin and had to settle for 2nd position just half a second shy of the win. “I kept missing 3rd gear. It must have lost me a second and half every lap.” With the majority of Phil’s bike to hand Stu again swapped machines for race 2. With his slackest start of the season he slotted into 5th and picked of each leading rival in the process to again score 2nd position and joint fastest lap at 1”10.30, again lapping faster on Phil’s machine.
 

During the next five weeks before the return to Cadwell’s full circuit the team decided to run their spare motor in Stu’s machine to solve the gear change problems and the breaking troubles on Phil’s machine was finally cured after the complete replacement of the breaking system. The ensuing meeting was scourged with incidents, accidents and oil spillages and the subsequent delays resulted in one extended race only for each class. Both Stu and Phil took to the front row eagerly anticipating the drop of the flag. Stu again grabbed the hole-shot while Phil slotted into 3rd. Phil was promoted to 2nd when second placed Steve Heneghan crashed out at the gooseneck on lap 1 as Stu made his escape. Championship leader Pete Whiteside battled his way past Phil on lap 3 as Stu already with a 4 second lead headed to the woodland section to complete lap 4. “I held Pete off for a lap or more and just hoped I had done enough to give Stu breathing space to take the win”. But disaster struck. As Stu approached the 2nd gear hairpin his throttle jammed open causing him to crash and slide into the surrounding tyre wall. Unhurt but hugely annoyed with losing such a lead Stu was up and on the barriers to safety before 2nd placed Whiteside pursued by Phil arrived on the scene. “I was chasing Pete as hard as I could but after Andrew Marshall and Stu had crashed in front of me I wanted to get a good result under my belt after having not ridden for 10 weeks”. The laps ticked by and Phil eventually slipped to a still impressive 4th place despite having not raced for 10 weeks. Whiteside took the win and secured the championship in the process.
With only minimal damage to Stu’s bike repaired before the next round at Darley Moor in Derbyshire and with the championship out of reach the riders saw this next meeting as a time to relieve the pressure and get back to just enjoying a good race. With a highly competitive field of riders including local track specialists and Steve Tomes, winner of a British motorcycle grand prix support race at Donington Park beating Barry Sheene in the process, Phil and Stu took to the front row for race 1. In a static and spaced out eight lap race both riders finished in the points with Stu 5th and Phil 6th. Race 2 was much closer with most of the excitement generated by the team SP Racing riders of Stu and Phil locked in a race long battle nose to tail for the entire race. With differing machine performance Stu maintained his advantage to the flag with superior corner exit speed whilst Phil pegged back the advantage with his superior straight line top speed to trail by just fractions of a second as they again took 5th and 6th respectively. “Phil was on good form today. I egged him on a few of times by looking behind and whipping my seat. That was the closest race we’ve ever had and was good fun” said an excited Stu. Phil remarked “I was chasing Stu hard and kept making little mistakes through the first chicane which lost me time but I was pleased to have some fun after the problems with my bike earlier this year. I guess I will have to wait a bit longer to beat Stu”.
With the Derby Phoenix club championship already decided and the final round on the Isle of Anglesey in September the team decided not to compete to conserve funds for possible alternatives. “Managing the team’s resources is very much a business matter and with the championship decided it seemed wasteful to travel across to the Island for very little possible gain. With an exciting class change in prospect the conservation of every penny is doubly important”.

With Phil temporarily hanging up his boots due to personal commitments the team have aspirations for Stu to contest as many championship meetings as possible with the emphasis again on the Derby Phoenix club championship.

After enjoying the long winter break the team are now preparing for and greatly looking forward to embarking on the pre-season testing to fine tune the changes to machinery and to re-hone the much needed race skills required to assault a serious challenge on the forth coming championship. “ We feel much more prepared for the up-coming season than last year as we haven’t had the concern of obtaining crucial spares so have been able to focus our attentions much more clearly. Last season we made some vast development changes which all needed to be married together and tested before we could progress with the process of practicing and racing. This year we will be able to reap the benefits of the hard work last season” said an ever optimistic Stu.

Stu, with two machines at his disposal this season with Phil’s absence from the track, will be looking to get both bikes set to his riding style in testing sessions at Mallory Park and Cadwell Park at the end of February and through March. Phil will be supporting Stu with technical assistance at the track side and logging invaluable data which all aids the set-up process taking the team into the first round of the new Derby Phoenix championship at Cadwell Park on Sunday 25th March. “Cadwell is an especially good place for us to start the championship as Stu has had some great results there in the past so should be very strong from the word go. And I'll be doing all I can to spur him on both on and off the track!” Phil said with excitement.

SP Racing always have an eye to the future and when questioned on stepping up in class said “Given the choice, if we were to leave the 400cc category we would have to go the whole hog and step up to the blue riband class in British racing – British Superbikes”. With aspirations to contest the Sky Sports and BBC Grandstand televised championship at privateer level in the next few year the team are realistic. Naturally such a venture would require significantly more revenue to fund a season’s racing and would be dependant on the team acquiring further backing to join the ever supportive league of sponsors listed below. Special thanks to Keith & Sandra Moores of Friskney Engineering for their assistance with the ongoing development work and finally a big thank you again to all those involved with the team... and here’s to greater success in the future….

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