Knockhill BSB: Ray ‘surprised’ by Saturday pace

In his own words, Brad Ray’s had a phenomenal start to the 2022 Bennetts British Superbike Championship and it showed no signs of slowing down at Knockhill where first, second and fourth saw him maintain his lead to the top of the championship standings.

The two podiums made it a total of ten from twelve races and the Rich Energy OMG Yamaha rider, who underwent an operation to help alleviate arm pump after the previous round, was delighted to continue his strong from in Scotland.

“I had a plan before the first race to see what the pace was but when the flag dropped I got my head down and managed to open up a bit of a gap,” Ray said afterwards.

“I felt really relaxed on the bike so cracked on and did my own thing. I saw the gap was increasing so kept my head down and managed it at the end of the race. I was a bit surprised at how the race panned out but I felt really good on the bike and had no issues at all.

“In previous races I’ve had to push at the beginning of the race whereas this weekend I’ve been able to push mid-race as well so the arm was all fine and I’m really happy.”

Having slipped back to fourth in Sunday’s opening, he responded in fine style in the final race of the weekend and led Jason O’Halloran for much of the way before ultimately having to settle for second.

“We made a change for the second race on Sunday and it definitely gave me a little bit more pace although not quite enough to beat Jason,” he admitted on Sunday evening. “It’s been a phenomenal start to the year though with regular podium credits and solid points so we’ll just keep taking it round by round.”