Ryan Farquhar's return to Irish Road Racing saw more records broken at the Tandragee 100 road races last Saturday as he became the first rider to record more than 200 wins in the history of Irish Road Racing. The KMR Kawasaki rider was victorious in the Classic race and followed this up with the same result after another dominant performance, this time in the Moto 450cc race, to make it a staggering 201 Irish road race wins in total.
Practice around the demanding 5.3-mile circuit saw the Dungannon rider top the timesheets in the Supertwin, Classic 1000cc and Moto 3 categories, unofficially breaking the lap record in all three, and Ryan opened his account on race day when, riding Roger Winfield’s 500cc Paton, he dominated the Classic race, winning the 500cc category and the race outright.
It was his 200th victory in Irish Road Racing and it soon became 201 when he took a start to finish victory in the combined Moto 3/Moto 450 race. Riding his 450cc Kawasaki, Ryan also set a new lap record of 95.418mph. Hopes of a 202nd win evaporated though when, with spots of rain falling, Ryan opted out of the closing Supertwin race. However, third team member Connor Behan did contest the shortened three-lap race and he went on to claim his first Irish National road race victory having earlier taken a fine fourth in the Supersport 600cc race.
Sadly, the meeting was overshadowed by the death of Republic of Ireland rider Noel Murphy and everyone at KMR Kawasaki would like to pass on their condolences to all of Mr Murphy's family and friends.
Ryan Farquhar: “First of all, and on behalf of the whole team, I’d like to express my sympathy to everyone who knew Noel, as it, naturally, put a whole dampener on the meeting. Everyone regrouped as best they could and I was pleased to take my 200th and 201st wins, particularly the first win of the day on Roger’s Paton. He’s played a big part in my racing for a good number of years so I felt proud to have taken the 200th Irish race victory of my career on one of his bikes. I hadn’t ridden the 450 for a while but dusted it down and she never missed a beat so it was nice to get a double.”
“The new Supertwin I rode was flying in practice and having lapped inside the lap record I was really looking forward to the race. However, with the NW200 and TT being on the horizon I decided to sit the race out when the spots of rain fell whilst Keith pulled out after learning of the tragic accident. I told him there was no pressure from me to ride as we’d already got enough signatures for our Mountain Course licence so we’d done what we needed to do. Connor wanted to go out and I was delighted to see him take a great victory so we’re all now really looking forward to the North West 200 where all three of us, as well as Jeremy McWilliams, will line up in the two Supertwin races.”
Practice for the International North West 200 road races gets underway on Tuesday 13th May with races scheduled for Thursday 15th and Saturday 17th.
Photo - Ryan Farquhar took his 200th Irish Road Racing win on the 500cc Winfield Paton. Courtesy of Stephen Davison - Pacemaker Press International
