Dan Kneen got his 2012 Metzeler National 1000cc Superstock Championship campaign firmly up and running at Oulton Park on Bank Holiday Monday when he took his Marks Bloom Racing Suzuki into a superb 12th place. The Braddan rider made a brilliant start to the race and overhauled over a dozen riders to move up from 28th on the grid and claim 4 well earned Championship points.
The weekend started steadily for Dan though with 36th place in Saturday's opening qualifying session but with a number of improvements to the bike, he was able to take almost two seconds off his time in the final session on Sunday to move up to 28th place and ensure he qualified for the race outright. Further changes to the front end of the bike were made in preparation for Monday's 14-lap race.
Indeed, Dan eventually made drastic changes, reverting to the set-up he had used at the early season Donington Park meeting and with the forecasted rain holding off, he was able to take to the grid for a fully dry race. Starting from the 7th row of the grid should have made for a tough race but with the aforementioned lightning start, he made huge strides forward on the opening lap and passed a staggering 12 riders to move up to 16th. His progress didn't stop there and, lapping almost a second quicker than what he had done in qualifying, he soon moved up to 14th and by half race distance he was up to 12th. With his pace similar to that of the leading group, positions remained the same for the next few laps and with the race ending prematurely, Dan was able to hold onto a superb 12th place and take his first points of the season.
Speaking afterwards, a pleased Dan commented: "I'm well chuffed with today's result especially after the changes I made meant I went into the race a little bit blind. We'd been changing things all weekend and although we were continually improving, it was only by small amounts so I decided to go back to what we had at Donington back in March and it paid dividends. I made a lightning start and really got stuck in and the pleasing thing was that the leading riders weren't that far in front of me nor were they pulling away. By the time I'd got up to 12th, they'd opened up a gap but once there it remained pretty much the same and lapping so much quicker than what I'd done in qualifying showed how much happier I was with the handling of the bike, especially the front end. I was able to run with the riders I know I'm capable of running with so it's great to finally get the result I know I'm capable of and it's a good platform for us to build on. There's still room for improvement with the bike but if I can hit the ground running next time out and qualify well, I'm sure a top ten finish is just around the corner."
The next round of the series will see two races held at Donington Park alongside the World Superbike Championship programme. The event takes place on May 11-13.
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