Josh Brookes left Oulton Park disappointed after a spectacular accident in race two cost him the chance of his victory since Cadwell Park last year.
The Relentless Suzuki rider ended with just a sixth place in race one to show for his efforts after a weekend which promised so much.
Brookes ran as high as second in the opening race of the day with Michael Laverty leading from pole position and despite ending up in fifth, the 28 year old was just 0.955s behind second placed John Hopkins.
Race two saw further evidence of the GSX-R1000's front-running potential as Brookes challenged Stuart Easton for the lead, with the pair of them pulling out a sizeable advantage on the rest of the field.
But approaching half distance, Brookes lost the front end entering the Britten's chicane, sending the bike cartwheeling over the kerb and into retirement, leaving the Australian wondering what might have been.
“I’m hurting but I’m not hurt, although I can’t work out what is worse: sixth or crashing. In race one we started fast but drifted away, but we made changes for race two and the bike felt almost on rails as it was strong and a lot better.”
“To be fair, Easton was slowing me up in places; I just wanted to set my own pace as it’s hard to see apexes at Oulton through those little chicanes following someone. It’s disappointing as I believe we could have won that one, but we’ll give it more of the same next time out and hopefully it’ll be our day.”
Team Manager Phillip Neill refused to be too critical if his rider, admitting he understood Brookes' desire to challenge for race victory.
“We were seven or eight laps away from this being a great weekend, but that’s racing. The first BSB race was a good race, but we improved things for race two; Josh just made a huge mistake which he knows was not necessary. The bike can’t be faulted today and really and truly Josh can’t be faulted either; he’s a racer and he was on it, so we can’t expect him not to push for the win when he feels it’s there. We’re obviously just not finding the correct recipe at the minute.”
