Following the successful Nürburgring
tests, heavy lobbying from the rider line-up and Hugh Brashers generosity in providing a Nova gearbox, has
resulted in the team debuting its new P&M Suzuki this weekend.

The final decision will be made after more tests on Friday 5th Sept at the circuit where the team hope to get another two hours of tracktime in order to optimise some of the settings.

There were three area of work following the test; gear selection, ground clearance and clutch slip. All have been addressed by the team in the last week, after a big effort. .Much other work has also taken place to give a least a basic minimum of spares and improve the probability of finishing ….this race will be the bikes first 4 hrs continuous run.!

Peter continues to recover from his Swedish crash in July and his broken ribs and bruised lung remain sore. Cormac is regaining form after a lean spell and Hugh continues to benefit (as always) from more track time.

Nürburgring really is only 4 hrs by car or bike from Calais, so there are no excuses for not being there….and this is the heart of Bitburger country.!

RB

The provisional standings are:
1. Team Force                    50
2. Sweatshop Phase One    36
3. Hampe  Racing Team      22
4. Motobel                          20
5. Roadrunner                     19
6. Alf’s Motorcycles            16
7. Les Melting Pots             15
8. Neate Racing                  13

The team track test the P&M Suzuki again this week at Nurburgring with Hugh Brasher, Cormac Conroy and the recovering Peter Linden. The new Suzuki proved fast at Donington but the team are aiming to improve performance further with some different carburettors and shock absorbers. The new bike weighed in 3 kgs heavier than the Kawasaki last week, but there is a long way to go with weight reduction as well as power improvement.

The Nurburgring race is over the weekend of 6/7th September, we hope you can make it.

The Team have just completed 3 days testing at Donington Park on the new P&M Suzuki. Peter Linden was originally planned for the test but crashed heavily in Sweden two weeks ago, breaking two ribs and bruising a lung.

Ian Simpson kindly agreed at short notice to stand in for Peter and proved the ideal replacement. Despite the relatively small amount of track time , the vast majority of the team’s objectives were achieved before the weather turned this morning and the final day was abandoned.

The new bike proved powerful and controllable, although a steering damper was necessary to calm the front end lightness over uneven surfaces etc. With 140 BHP on tap, the bike was always going to have different characteristics to the Kawasaki, but none proved detrimental and a base setting was found to take on to the Nurburgring tests next week. Good settings were found for carburation and  ignition curves.
Ian gave great feedback and was a pleasure to work with.

Meeting of minds. Steve Bones of FTR and Richard Peckett of  P&M

Thanks to all involved and sorry to those ( Lee) that came to watch today and went away with nothing more than pitlane chat.!!

Peter, Hugh and Cormac will all be back for the German test on 20/21st August.

Lancaster fly by

It’s well worth getting this month’s Classic Racer, nice article on Spa Francorchamps.

The Team Force entry of Greg Fastre and Richard Hubin dominated the race with a text book performance from start to finish, winning the race from the MotoBel Guzzi and Sweatshop Phase One, all finishing on the same lap. John Neate and family’s plucky performance gave them a well deserved and popular 4th place.

Peter Linden, Hugh Brasher and Cormac Conroy’s measured performance in extremely difficult conditions gave the team a well deserved 3rd place in the race and solidified the team’s 2nd position in the 2014 ECS championship. Despite sunny warm conditions during Friday qualifying, the race day weather was appalling; the race started damp, went wet and got wetter!

The conditions were not improved by a pretty thorough layer of oil being deposited in the classic races and parades that proceeded the main event. An early casualty of the conditions was Alf’s Bob Collins who fell after about 40 mins, taking the Alf’s P&M Kawasaki that he shared with Mick Godfrey, out of the race. Another of the 64 starters, Team Bolliger also went out after just 5 laps. Steve Boam and Steve Clark retired the SCERT Suzuki after alternator failure. It really was one of those very tricky races which rewarded those that took a steady and measured approach; the oil, the wet and the dark, all presenting separate challenges.

Sweatshop Phase One’s rider line up and pit crew did exactly what was necessary, without error, to secure second in the championship, pulling on third but losing out to the Team Force Bakker Suzuki which increased its leading margin.

The Sweatshop Phase One team will work hard in the next month to get its new P&M GSX1100 Suzuki ready for testing at Donington Park over the weekend classic festival of 10th August, with a view to taking the fight to Team Force at Nurburgring on the 5th September.

Thanks to all our sponsors, team members and supporters for your continued backing.

Pictures by Jacco Dijkhuizen and ECS