Conor Cummins endured a frustrating race at Croft on Sunday where he was competing in round 3 of the Metzeler National 1000cc Superstock Championship and although 18th equalled his best result of the year, he was left pondering what might have been.

Following the trend of the opening two rounds, Conor quickened his pace over the two days of practice and qualifying, held in both wet and dry conditions, and in the final qualifying session, he was able to knock some 1.6s off his time to qualify in 22nd place for a sixth row start.The race itself on Sunday saw dry conditions and after maintaining his starting spot on the opening couple of laps, Conor began to move forward and with Howie Mainwaring and Adam Jenkinson going out in the second half of the race, he was able to cross the line at the end of the 12 laps in 18th place thus equalling his result of Oulton Park two weeks ago. Once again, he also lapped quicker in the race than what he had done in qualifying although problems under acceleration meant he wasn't happy with the end result.


Talking later, Conor said;

"Practice went well and, like always, I just chipped away and got quicker with each and every session. I lost a bit of time in second qualifying due to the padding on the seat moving around a bit but I went over a second and a half quicker and to be only half a second off the top 15 put me in a good frame of mind for the race."

"The race itself though was the poorest I've had since I got back and although it equalled my best finish of the season, it was very frustrating. Although I was lapping quicker each time I went out, I was struggling with the bike wheelying coming out of the corners and that meant I was losing a lot of time along the straights so no sooner was I gaining time, I was losing it straightaway. We thought we'd got it cured for the race but it wasn't to be and I simply wasn't able to move forward as I would have liked. Everyone's working really hard and I'm edging ever closer to the top 15 and Championship points, so we'll keep working hard and look at getting into the top 15 as soon as possible."

Conor now heads to Northern Ireland for his first public road race of the season, the International North West 200, where he will link up once more with the McAdoo Racing team. Practice takes place on Tuesday and Thursday with the 5 races on Saturday, May 21.



Phil Wain
Freelance PR