August 20, 2019

Wet weather thwarts Tuesday's practice sessions at Manx

Wet weather thwarts Tuesday’s practice sessions at Manx

Practice for the Classic TT and Manx Grand Prix was cancelled on Tuesday evening due to heavy rain around the Mountain Course.

Only one qualifying evening has gone ahead so far on Monday, which was cut short following a red flag incident at the start of the Senior/Junior Classic qualifying session. The session was not re-started after a heavy shower at Brandish coupled with fading light saw the action called off.

It was later confirmed that Mark Herbertson was the rider involved in the incident at the Black Hut, which occurred as the Superbike session was nearing an end. He was taken by airmed to Nobles Hospital where his condition was described as stable. The English rider was due to have surgery on a leg injury on Tuesday.

Clerk of the Course Gary Thompson hoped to run a Classic Senior and Junior session at the start of the evening on Tuesday in a change to the schedule, but poor weather once again thwarted the organisers on the Isle of Man.

The organisers now intend to utilise an emergency qualifying session on Thursday afternoon, subject to marshal availability.

In this instance, roads would close at 12.30pm and reopen between 4.30pm-6pm before closing again for the planned evening programme.

This year’s TT races were hit by some of the worst continuous wet weather in recent memory and it has been another frustrating start to the Classic TT and Manx Grand Prix.

Practice was due to get underway at 6.20pm but a number of short delays were announced before Thompson finally cancelled the session at approximately 6.50pm as a result of heavy rain around the 37.73-mile course.

On Monday, Bruce Anstey set the fastest lap of the evening in the Lightweight session at 116.28mph on Clive Padgett’s Honda RS250.

The 50-year-old New Zealander is making his competitive return to the event after missing the past two seasons through serious illness.

Senior TT winner Dean Harrison headed the Classic Superbike times on the Silicone Engineering Kawasaki at 123.42mph from a standing start.

The 30-year-old did not complete a flying lap after signalling that the exhaust had come loose on his ZXR750.

Harrison has won the feature Superbike race for the past two seasons and will again line up as the race favourite on Bank Holiday Monday.

Wednesday’s forecast on the Isle of Man does not offer much cause for optimism with heavy rain showers expected in the evening.

A decision will be made ahead of the planned road closure as to whether the session will run.

The provisional schedule is as follows:

Quote:





18.00: All roads closed around the TT Mountain Course
18.20-19.10: Classic TT Junior and Senior
19.15-20.00: Classic TT Lightweight and Superbike
21.00: All Roads Open



Source: Wet weather thwarts Tuesday’s practice sessions at Manx

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

14 − 5 =