Knockhill BSB: ‘Better showing’ sees Brookes top six

For the first time since round two at the beginning of May, Josh Brookes and MCE Ducati were back in the top six of a Bennetts British Superbike race at Knockhill.

Although a far cry from the results the former champions are accustomed to, the Australian looked a lot more competitive over the course of the weekend and was running in the top three in the final race before a mistake at the chicane cost him several places. “We’ve shown some promise this weekend and although the results don’t show it, we’ve been a lot closer to the front and closer to fighting where we should be,” Brookes confirmed from Scotland. “Even when I’ve been winning races in previous seasons, Knockhill hasn’t been the best circuit for me so I didn’t have many expectations ahead of the weekend but we brought the progress made at Donington here to Scotland and we’ve made constant steps in the right direction.” After taking tenth in qualifying, Brookes took the same result in Saturday’s race before going on to take sixth and seventh on Sunday when he lapped quicker than he had done all weekend. The results saw him move up from twelfth to ninth overall in the title standings, just seven points off the top eight. “We had a bit of a lull in qualifying but other than that, we’ve moved forward and whilst I was disappointed to have made a mistake in the final race, the fact we were in third place at the time is positive,” he continued. “It’s been a better showing all round and we can be optimistic heading into the next round.”