JG Speedfit Kawasaki’s Leon Haslam experienced a high-speed dramatic crash during the second MCE British Superbike race at Oulton Park, but fortunately he came away from the fall with no broken bones, and is just bruised and sore.
The current championship leader went to the medical centre, and was discharged this afternoon and was given the all clear, after being in an incident involving McAMS Yamaha’s James Ellison.
Haslam tried to make a pass on the inside of the R1, whilst in third, but ended up clipping the side of the Yamaha and chaos ensued. The ZX-10RR smashed into a thousand pieces at Bailey Bridge. Ellison, who was in second place came to a stop at Lodge Hall. It later transcribed that Ellison experienced engine problems and it cut out completely.
Ellison then went to check if Haslam was OK, and now his team have time to rebuild the Kawasaki before the next round at Knockhill.
“We finished race two not in the best way. We had a big, big crash. James Ellison’s bike cut out right in front of me and I went over the handle bars. Luckily I am all ok,” said Haslam at the track.
“Quite disappointed as I had the fastest lap of the race and just closing back in on Shakey as well. So frustrated as I felt I could have challenged for another win - but that’s racing and now I have World Superbike next and hoping for some good news.”
On-board with Haslam leading up to the crash
Team manager Jack Valentine is confident that Haslam will come back even stronger at the next round at Knockhill, and the team will undertake some testing before the Scottish round.
“I had loads of things planned that was going to be happening starting next week. But these will be put on hold until we rebuild that. The crash was massive and it was written off. Juat need next week to regroup and make a plan to move foward and are looking to get some testing in before June. The main thing is nothing has broken and he is a tough cookie,” said Valentine, speaking to bikesportnews.com.
But the weekend was not a complete disaster for Haslam as he made it on to the top step of the podium in the opening race, and still leads the series, but his advantage has been cut to three points.
“We have been working on tyre and race runs from Friday and we knew we could do the pace for 18 laps on that tyre, but the unknown factor was what Shane and the other riders were going to do,” said Haslam after race one.
“Managed to get a good start and get into an easy rhythm at the beginning and then push on a bit in the middle. At the end I had plus zero on the board so we pushed on a bit more and luckily we pulled a few tenths of a gap, so it was nice to have that cushion with two laps to go, but it was not an easy race.”
