Toparis ends challenging weekend with a top ten at Donnington Park

After a difficult weekend in mixed conditions, Tom Toparis ended with a tenth place in the second British Supersport race at Donington Park. The Aussie crashed in the first lap of the wet first race. After his first ride back since his wrist injury, the Benro Racing rider was looking to find his rhythm and confidence again, and the weather didn’t make it any easier.

Benro Racing returned to the British Supersport Championship during the fifth round of the season at Donington Park. Tom Toparis was recovered from his broken wrist after a crash in the first round of the season. Even though Toparis hadn’t been on the bike for a long time, the pace wasn’t bad in the first free practice session. The Aussie set the eleventh quickest time in FP1. In the second session Toparis stayed in the box, as it rained last minute before the session and the team decided to sit it out.

The timetable for Saturday and Sunday had changed because of the bad weather forecast, so qualifying was cancelled. The starting grid was based on the lap times in the free practice sessions. Toparis was to start from the fifth row. It was a completely soaked circuit, and unfortunately the race ended very early for the Benro Racing rider. On the slippery track Toparis crashed in the first lap. So the Aussie was very motivated to end the weekend with a good result in the second race.

This forced Toparis to start from the sixth row on a dry track. The Benro Racing rider had a good start and managed to gain eight places on the first lap. Toparis ended up in a group of riders who were fighting for eighth place. During the race it became clear that the 20-year old rider lacked some rhythm. Toparis finished the race as fifteenth overall and tenth in the British Supersport class.

In two weeks (16-18 October) is the final round of the BSB championship. This event will be held at Brands Hatch.

Tom Toparis: I was honestly just happy to see the end of this weekend. It was definitely one of the most difficult weekends I’ve ever had. It’s good to be back on the bike after the long break with my broken wrist. The weather wasn’t at all good during the weekend. It was freezing cold with a lot of wet sessions. I want apologise to my team for the crash in Race 1. Unfortunately I’m just struggling a lot with feeling at this point in time, after not riding at all lately, and still trying to push towards the front, I keep finding myself on the ground which is the worst possible scenario. Although to be fair, in these terrible race 1 weather conditions, more people crashed than finished it seemed. It was good to see the finish flag in Race 2, although it was a difficult race. My wrist is still causing me a bit of grief, so we’ll try to sort it for the next round at Brands Hatch. As always, thanks to my team for doing everything possible to get me going good again, hopefully we can end the season on a positive note in a position towards the front where the team and the bike belongs.”