Donington BSB: O’Halloran reigns in race two

Jason O’Halloran claimed first place in Sunday’s opening Bennetts British Superbike Championship race at Donington Park, the McAMS Yamaha rider taking his first win of the season as he came home 2.5s clear of Bradley Ray (Rich Energy OMG Yamaha) with Lee Jackson (Cheshire Mouldings FS-3 Kawasaki) taking third.

O’Halloran grabbed the holeshot from pole position and he led at the end of the opening lap from Ray, Kyle Ryde on the second Rich Energy machine, Glenn Irwin (Honda Racing), Jackson and Christian Iddon (Buildbase Suzuki) but Ray hit the front second time around. Leon Jeacock (Specsavers Suzuki) was out though having crashed at McLeans and Tommy Bridewell (Oxford Products Ducati) went down at the same spot a lap later. Ryde soon made it a Rich OMG one-two and by lap four the running order was Ray, Ryde, O’Halloran, Irwin, Jackson and Iddon, Ray’s advantage over his teammate just under half a second. Less than a second covered the leading trio with Irwin and Jackson locked in battle for fourth. However, Saturday’s race winner Ryde crashed out at McLean’s on the sixth lap and that allowed Ray’s lead to stretch out to 1.3s whilst a lap later Jackson overhauled Irwin for third. Iddon moved up to fifth after Ryde’s demise with Leon Haslam up to sixth on the VisionTrack Kawasaki. Ray was continuing to control proceedings at the head of the field but O’Halloran cut the deficit to 0.7s on lap ten and just one lap later it was down to a quarter of a second. Jackson was going with O’Halloran too with 0.8s now covering the top three. Irwin was a further 0.7s back in fourth with Iddon 2.5s back in fifth. O’Halloran slid up the inside of Ray at the chicane at the end of lap 11 and the running order on lap 13, half race distance,