Last year’s winner of the Ken Wootton perpetual trophy, Jeremy McWilliams, has had a steady start to this year’s Phillip Island Classic today at the unofficial free practice day at the seaside circuit.

When asked if everything went according to plan throughout the day he replied with; “No, does anything ever go according to plan? When you have this many machines there is always going to be some issues and we have had our fair share of it.”

In saying that, shakedown days like today, is what they are for. So with some of the ‘hiccups’ out of the way early, hopefully things will be ok for Team GB tomorrow for qualifying.

“Unfortunately Michael [Rutter] came off at turn twelve and had a clutch problem, so there is quite a bit of rebuilding to do with his bike. Glen [Richards] has had some carburation issues. Apart from that, Hicky’s bike is going well, my bike is going good and Lee [Johnson] is getting himself dialled in. So when you look at it, it’s not really that bad,” McWilliams explained to bikesportnews.com.

The 53-year-old is just hoping he will be able to have a clear run in qualifying tomorrow, as riders are always trying to fight for their own piece of track in short sessions.

“If we can qualify there thereabouts and put ourselves in a strong position it should be alright,” declared McWilliams, who started from pole position last year.

McWilliams also admitted that both the Australian and American teams are looking much stronger than what he has seen before. “It’s what we expected. The American’s bikes are real quick, and to be fair their team have done a really good job on them. Same deal with Troy. He’s managed to find his feet fairly quickly. With all of this, I believe it will make for a really good spectacle.”

bikesportnews.com also quizzed McWilliams on how he was feeling fitness-wise, as he admitted last year that his conditioning was not 100 per cent due to not having enough time to be able to train as much as he would have liked to due to work commitments.

“I did feel ok today, but then again I’m doing short stints to try and save the motor and not to get tangled up with traffic as it was quite a busy day today. I think it will be telling tomorrow when we have to do longer sessions and even more so when we get this forecasted heat coming in and on Saturday and Sunday.”

It goes without saying that no rider particularly likes riding in the heat. However, you just have to get on with it.
McWilliams and co do prefer to ride in the temperature, like it was today in the low 30’s, for the rest of the weekend it is predicted to be around 35-37 degree mark.

“It is what it is. It just makes it unpleasant that’s all. On top of that, the tyre durability changes and the performance of the bikes will drop a little bit when they are super-hot. As I said, it is what it is. I left all that behind me when I was racing in MotoGP. You just accepted it back then. Now days you would like to be able to pick and choose, but that’s not going to happen.”

McWilliams managed to clock an unofficial 1min38 around the 4.445km circuit today, which he regards as ‘slow’. “I need to be going quicker than that. To be honest nobody really goes that much quicker than a 38 on the first day.”

If McWilliams could tip into the 37s tomorrow, he would be more than happy as that will give him and the team a good base setting to work from for the remaining part of the weekend.