Kyle Ryde has weekend to forget in ninth round of British Supersport 600cc championship

Ryde’space wasn’t all there in the early free practice sessions on the Friday and again series leader Luke Stapleford was setting the pace, followed closely by Dixon, Rispoli and Reid.

Ryde did manage to claw some time back and by the end of the free practice sessions he was up into a more secure fifth place 0.9 seconds down on Stapleford.

Qualifying was to be dominated by Ulsterman Reid, with Jake Dixon taking second place on the front row of the grid, whilst Kyle was battling again with Stapleford for the last remaining slot on the front row, losing out by only a small margin.

Rdye had to finally settle for fourth slot on the second row of the grid, ahead of American Champion Rispoli and Stapleford’s Team mate Sam Hornsey.

Reid had a battle on his hands with Stapleford snatching the lead, after trading places several times early in the Saturday sprint race.

Reid came back, leading the third lap, but then in a hectic scrap at the front Dixon snatched the lead, whilst Ryde who had lost time when Irwin crashed in front of him on the first lap was now in the hunt with this front runners, pushing Reid back another place.

Ryde then looked to make Stapleford his next scalp to go second, but this move on Stapleford was short lived as Rispoli moved ahead of them both to attack Dixon, who still managed to hold onto the the lead in this fast moving pace. 

It was then all change again with Stapleford fighting back, going second with Reid a close third.

This wasn’t to last long as the pack had to pursue Dixon yet again with Reid grabbing second, Ryde overhauled Stapleford to third. 

But with Reid showing lots of determination, he took the fight to Dixon, going through on the penultimate lap with Ryde following him in second place.

Jake Dixon was back to third going into the final lap just ahead of Luke, but then at Old Hall, Dixon forced Ryde out towards the edge of the track and this made Ryde run wide onto the rubble strip and down he went, ending his chances of any podium in the sprint race. 

Dixon managed to secure second place ahead of Stapleford, but at the head of the pack, Reid had the edge and the race victory, whilst his team-mate Rispoli came in fifth, ahead of Stapleford’s team-mate of Sam Hornsey.

Kyle was going into Sunday’s feature race full of confidence and because he had a good race pace in the Saturday Sprint race before the crash.

However, it wasn’t to be as during the morning warm-up session Ryde was going through ‘Hislop’ bends on towards ‘Nickerbrook’ when, as he stood the bike up after the bend, the bike threw a massive ‘High-side’ and went spinning out of control towards the barriers, bringing Ryde down on the tarmac in front of the machine.

It turns out that Luke Hedger’s Kawasaki had blown a head gasket and had sprayed a small amount of oil on the track, enough to bring Ryde tumbling down and giving Rispoli a hairy moment as well.

So with Ryde now having a broken toe and no bits left to repair the machine, as the team had used them all up from the previous crash on Saturday, Kyle just had to sit it out on the sideline and hope that Luke Stapleford didn’t accumulate too many points in the later feature race.

The race turned out to be just as fierce as the pace on the Saturday Sprint race, with all the same front runners battling it out.

The outcome was looking the same as the first race right until the final corner, then Reid charged down the inside of Dixon, but his bike spun around on him and again shown a huge ‘High-side’ leaving Reid in the middle of the track at the mercy of the rest of the competitors, whilst Dixon took the win, from Rispoli and Luke Stapleford Third.