10th and 12th in tonight’s 600 qualifying.

Ben Wylie pipped Ian Pattinson by two places in Thursday’s Supersport session. Both riders were happy with the set up on their bikes and returned their best 600 times of the week. Wylie’s time was 119.2 mph and Pattinson’s was 119.1mph.

On the Superbikes, Pattinson led the way with a 119.6mph lap, two mph down on yesterday’s best of 121.7 mph and Wylie returned a 119.2mph lap.

As well as the excellent Supersport times, the big breakthrough was with Ben Wylie’s Superbike. All week the team had struggled to find a workable set up which gave acceptable straight line stability over high speed bumps, and tonight that was found. A fork rebuild and lighter front spring rate appeared to solve the problem and further work in this area tomorrow should finesse it.

The team were happy to record another 6 laps tonight, taking the total to 32 laps, all trouble free. Tomorrow will be the last chance to make minor alterations before the superbike race planned for Saturday. The Team and riders were pleased with tonight’s progress.

26 laps and 1000 miles of practice completed

Wednesday night’s practice resulted in improvements for both riders. Wylie achieved 119.0 mph on the Superbike and Pattinson returned a best lap of 121.7 mph. Wylie managed four laps and Pattinson crammed in five, giving a weeks total of 26 trouble free laps. As both riders were largely happy with their 600s, the main focus was on the Superbikes. Pattinson tried a gearing change and some suspension tweaks and was happy, however Wylie really was suffering. The issue again was high speed stability. Geometry had been set from Pattinson’s bike and different shocks and spring rates were tried, but with only marginal improvement. As we go into Thursday’s sessions the focus will be on the Superbike front end.

Pattinson’s Superstock bike went well but for Thursday a slightly softer rear set up will be tried to improve things further.

Ian Pattinson 14th in Tuesday’s Supersport qualifying.

Phase One’s Ian Pattinson laid down his marker in the Supersport class on just his
2nd lap of practice yesterday. Lap 1 was for bedding down the brand new engine and lap 2 being a flyer at 117.5 mph. The session was headed by Miachel Dunlop at a speed of 122.7mph, with Keith Amor coming second at 122.6mph.

Ben Wylie settled well on his Supersport bike with a 115.2mph lap, some 23 seconds behind Ian. He had no problems with set up. Ian’s Superstock and Superbike settings proved “good enough to race” with only minor adjustments being needed before tomorrow’s sessions. High speed instability was holding down Ben Wylie’s lap times on his Superbike and it was planned to transfer the relevant data from Pattinson’s Superbike before Wednesday’s session.

Pattinson and Wylie go well at TT first practice.

Both riders completed four laps of the mountain circuit in tonight’s sessions. Pattinson achieved a best of 120MPH on his Superbike with Wylie at 119MPH. Each rider tested with two bikes, Pattinson on the Superbike and Superstock machines and Wylie went with the Superbike and 600. Conditions were good with an air temperature of around 14 degrees C and only light wind. No major problems were encountered, but Wylie’s Superbike engine will be receive a precautionary inspection prior to tomorrow’s session and the usual array of minor adjustments will be completed.

The Team plan to run all machines tomorrow, with an aim of achieving the maximum five laps per rider. Ben Wylie will try the 195 section rear in the Superbike in an effort to improve stability and Ian Pattinson will run the 600 for the first time.

The forecast for the rest of the week is for continuing dry conditions until Friday when there may be rain, so around a maximum of 16 or 18 laps could be possible.

Ian Pattinson to join Ben Wylie for TT Races

Ian Pattinson will replace Carl Rennie in the Phase One line up for next week’s TT Races.

Rennie failed to gel with the team at the NorthWest 200 event and Pattinson jumped at the opportunity to compete in his place.

Ian Pattinson, a Manx GP Race winner, is a regular top 15 finisher at the Isle of Man TT, with a best placed 8th in the Superstock event in 2007. Ian will compete alongside Ben Wylie in the Senior, Superbike and Supersport races and will take the Team’s single Superstock entry.

Ben Wylie’s stated ambition for the race is to achieve his first 125mph lap on the Team’s Superbike, following his Newcomer best of 121.7 mph last year.

Russell Benney: “This is a massive undertaking for the Team and really is very different. Probably the biggest difference is that we have enjoyed the luxury of working from a pitbox garage for 25 years and returning to multiple awnings is a challenge – just storing 5 bikes, plus an 08 Superbike as a spare is difficult enough!”

Following the cancellation of Saturday’s practice because of rain, tonights will be the first test.