Bradley Ray’s hopes of a Bennetts British Superbike title in his second year took another beating at Brands Hatch after a lack of confidence in the front of his GSX-R1000 meant he scored only three points.

The Buildbase Suzuki man was off the pace all weekend and even a big setup change in between yesterday’s races did nothing to help the Kent youngster.

“There’s not much to say to be honest, it wasn’t a good weekend for us. We just couldn’t find a good set-up for the two races. We struggled in race one and made a big change for race two, but it didn’t work sadly,” said Ray.

“I just didn’t have a good feeling and couldn’t push as I needed to. So we’ll put it behind us and take what we’ve learned. Suzuka’s next for me and hopefully we can battle for the win and at least come away with a podium. Then it’s Thruxton where we’ll come back strongly.”

Ray slips back to fifth in the title chase and is 127 points behind Leon Haslam with seven races left before the Showdown is decided.