By Intriguing stats, facts to emerge from another thrilling two weeks of Manx GP competition, include 12 of this years Mountain Course debutants lapping over the 110 mph mark.
Local debutant Nathan Harrison who was just a whisker away from lapping in excess of 118 mph, during last Friday’s Senior race, had the honour of finishing leading Manx racer following an impressive ride to 13th place.
Showpiece race victor Matt Stevenson, overall race winning speed of 118.383 would have placed him 29th within the opening Monster Energy Supersport encounter of TT 2018.
Continuing this theme, Andy Farrell’s Lightweight race 2 winning speed of 112.296 would have placed him 15th within the Bennetts Lightweight race of TT 2018.
Farrell like Senior victor Stevenson, alongside Steven Procter are the three newest ‘Tommy Club’ members, having set respective new personal best lap speeds of (120.247), (120.974) and (120.579).
Others to set huge new personal best lap speeds included Spain’s Victor Lopez Santos (119.739), Wayne Humble (119.528), Stephen Parsons (119.983), Dan Ingham (119.074) and Miroslav Sloboda (117.430).
Just two of the top twenty finishers within the drama filled 2018 Senior Manx GP were Honda mounted, they were 7th, 12th place finishers David Lumsden and new quickest Italian event racer in history, Francesco Curinga.
From the 59 finishers within the Mylchreests Junior race, only two Triumph mounted racers were to finish Kevin Barsby (43rd) and Stuart McCann (45th).
Photo by Mark Corlett
Paton now hold uniquely the record Super Twin lap speeds at the TT Races, Southern 100 and Manx Grand Prix, following James Chawke’s new record class lap speed of 114.993 mph, set during Friday morning’s second Lightweight encounter.
Junior class victor Chawke, tumultuous race win from last Wednesday morning, maintained Kawasaki’s unbeaten stretch in the class which goes back to 2015 when the late but great Billy Redmayne triumphed.
MV Agusta and Aprilia as at TT 2018 had no team/racer representation, but fellow illustrious Italian marque Ducati did courtesy of meeting veteran Bob Millinship.
In total 22 nations were represented in this years Manx Grand Prix, showcasing the truly global nature of an event which year in year out produces the TT stars of tomorrow.
Words by Stevie Rial
