Damp and slippery roads affected times at the opening practice session for the Blackford Financial Services Pre-TT Classic on the Billown circuit yesterday (Friday), but there were no incidents and a reasonable turnout of riders given the conditions.

Roy Richardson from Blackpool recorded the fastest lap of the evening in the combined 250 and 350, which is the only race scheduled for today.

He took his 350 Aermacchi round the course at 84.82 miles an hour, and was closely followed by local man Chris Palmer from Castletown, at 84.06. Many-times winner on the Billown circuit Bill Swallow from Huddersfield was third fastest in the 350, at 81.91 miles an hour.

Fastest in the 250 section was Paul Coward from Halifax, at 74.14 miles an hour, and his son Jamie topped the leaderboard on a 750 Suzuki in the Post Classic, at 85.89.

Third fastest in the 250 section was Ted Fenwick from York, last year's winner at the age of eighty-two!

Chris Palmer set the pace in the Senior and Junior classes, his speed in the former, 87.47 miles an hour on a 500cc Matchless, being the best of the night.

Nick Houghton and his local passenger Paul Thomas lapped at 76.48 miles an hour to top the list of practice times in the sidecars.

There is a further qualifying session this afternoon, from 1.15pm, with that one race at 4pm.

The main day of racing is on bank holiday Monday, May 30.