Courtsey of Willis Marshall
Michael Pearson hailed his first competitive outing on the ex SMT Honda Fireblade as very positive after the former Irish Superbike Champion took a podium place in Round Two of the Irish Superbike Championship meeting at Kirkistown on Easter Monday.
After having taken in some private testing on the MPRSC/Richard Rawson backed machine the previous week, Pearson went to Kirkistown in what was really a pre Spring Cup practice session for the Lisburn rider.
After qualifying on the second row for the two Irish Superbike Races over ten laps of the Co-Down circuit, Pearson made a great start and slotted into second place behind Wilson Craig Honda rider Cameron Donald.
Pearson was running with the Australian rider for the first three laps and was confident that he could have stuck with Donald only for Pearson's rear tyre to shred up leaving the Honda rider with severe grip problems, which almost cost him his runner up place to Donald.
In race two, Pearson got a poor start and was down in sixth place at the end of lap one, but he soon began to carve his way through the field and on lap five made a move into second place at the end of the back straight, only for Pearson to loose traction from the front end, which resulted in him slipping out of the race unhurt.
This weekend, Michael will travel to the Oliver's Mount circuit in Scarborough for the annual Spring Cup races where he will contest the Superbike races again on the MPRSC/Richard Rawson Honda Fireblade.
Michael Pearson: "Monday's races were very important for me as I needed to get some practice in on the Honda at competitive speed before the Spring Cup. We had a major tyre issue in that we did not have the correct tyres for the conditions which in race one where wet, damp and dry in different parts of the circuit. We had an intermediate rear tyre on the bike which had did some laps at the Ulster Grand Prix last year, and it just did not last the race distance, infact about three laps. I was very satisfied to get second place behind Cameron Donald and was hoping for more of the same in race two. I got a slow start which put me on the back burner from the word go and I had to make up ground on Emmett O'Grady, Denvor Robb and Brain McCormick, and was confident that I could get past them during the race. I tried to out brake them going into the hairpin, but just left it to late and I lost the front end, so it was game over for me. There was little damage done to the bike, and we will have it ready for this weekend. The Honda is very different from the BMW i rode last season, but she is a rite good bike, and I think she will be good enough for some decent results this year"
