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Luke Quigley made a start on preparations ahead of his 2011 British Superstock
Championship campaign today, as he made his first track appearance of the year.
Quigley gave the Formwise Astro Racing BMW its first run-out, since it underwent
a winter re-build, at a cold Mallory
Park.
The Formwise Astro Racing squad will once again contest the British Superstock
Championship with riders Luke Quigley and Matt Layt aboard a pair of BMW
S1000RRs. Quigley will be aiming to improve on last year's showing which saw him
finish up 5th in the overall championship standings and record a pair of second
place finishes, at Knockhill and Snetterton.
Today was the first chance Quigley has had to get some laps under his belt since
the final round of last season. "We have only finished building the bike up this
week," stated Quigley, "So this is the first chance that I have had to give the
bike a bit of a shakedown. One of the things we needed to check over the winter
was the frame alignment. After a couple of crashes towards the end of last
season, the bike didn't feel quite right. When we stripped it down of the winter
we had it checked and found that it was out of line."
Mallory Park in March is not usually the warmest of places to test and today was
no exception. Quigley remarked: "The temperature was a bit cold today, and it
wasn't really possible to push the bike much. However, it was OK for what we
needed, just to get the ball rolling."
Quigley and the team are now planning a few days of testing at Alcarras, near
Barcelona, at the start of April. "Hopefully when we get out to Spain, the
weather will be a bit more conducive to working on the chassis set-up," he said.
"I have been keeping an eye on some of the tests that have already taken place
out there, and it doesn't look like it's been much warmer than here."
"After we get back from Spain, we have the official BSB tests at Snetterton and
Brands Hatch but I am not sure if we are going to make those yet. We have some
new parts coming when we get back, so it will depend if we can get the bike
built in time to get to those tests. We could go to the tests and rebuild the
bike after, but I'd rather get the bike ready first."
Those official tests are scheduled to take place on the 12th (Brands Hatch) and 13th
(Snetterton) of April and then the season gets underway at Brands Hatch over the
Easter weekend. |
