Jason O’Halloran picked up where he left off yesterday afternoon as he headed the times in this morning’s third Bennetts British Superbike Championship practice session.
The McAMS Yamaha rider set a hot lap of 53.802 in the closing moments of the 45-minute session, one of just three riders to dip into the 53s this morning.
As the first BSB stint of the day got underway in the blazing Silverstone sunshine, several riders took their turn at the top as the times tumbled.
Keith Farmer was an early casualty when he crashed his Tyco BMW just a few minutes in, while Tommy Bridewell stopped at turn one early in the session, but was able to return to the garage and get back out 10 minutes later.
With 11 minutes gone, Be Wiser Ducati’s Scott Redding hit the top of the timesheets with a 54.097s lap, as the second McAMS bike of Taz Mackenzie, Josh Elliott on the OMG Suzuki and O’Halloran fell into place behind, separated by just 0.148s.
With 20 minutes to go, Redding’s team-mate Josh Brookes jumped up to fifth as FS-3 Racing’s Danny Buchan moved up to third before hitting second a lap later.
Redding was still occupying the top spot but with 12 minutes remaining, Claudio Corti clocked a 54.038s on the Team WD40 Kawasaki to knock him down to second.
With six minutes to go, Brookes moved ahead of his team-mate to go second and then a lap later went top with a 54.009s.
Moments later Corti crashed out at Becketts, while on track Brookes was going even quicker and became the first to set a lap in the 53s.
But yesterday’s quickest man, O’Halloran, still had more in the tank and he seared to a 53.802 as the session hit the final two minutes.
No-one was able to pull out anything any faster, and the Aussie took the bragging rights ahead of this afternoon’s qualifying.
Brookes finished the day second ahead of Mackenzie, while Corti held onto fourth ahead of Redding in fifth, Buchan sixth and the first Tyco BMW of Christian Iddon seventh.
Ben Currie proved to be the quickest of the Quattro Plant JG Speedfit Kawasakis in eighth, as Andrew Irwin was the best of the Hondas in ninth as Elliott held onto tenth.
