By Phil Wain
May 22 2005

Guy Martin put in his best ever International performances at the North West 200 road races on Saturday, which included a brilliant fifth place in the feature Superbike race. It was a fraught week for the Lincolnshire youngster, with all of his machines beset by problems in the two evening practice sessions. The Superbike engine blew up on Tuesday, and damaged radiators on the 600cc Honda meant the team were busy until the early hours of the morning on more than one occasion.

With race day blighted by frequent rain and hail showers, Guy took 11th in the first Superbike race, before retiring with a broken gear selector shaft in the opening 600cc race. He then rode the Barron Transport Suzuki into another 11th place in the Superstock race, and proceeded to take the Tullyally Car Breakers Honda all the way from the back of the grid to a superb seventh place in the second 600cc race. The NW200 Superbike race was the final race on the programme and Guy put in a stunning ride on the Robinson Concrete Suzuki to take fifth, overhauling the works TAS Suzuki of Adrian Archibald in the latter stages.

Speaking at the end of a hectic day, Guy commented: “All in all it was a pretty good day. We had so many problems during practice it was unbelievable, and we had to use Darran Lindsay’s Superbike engine from last year’s bike for the races, only finishing building it at 1am on Saturday morning. It wasn’t the fastest bike out there and wasn’t 100% for me, so to get fifth in the main event was very pleasing. As for the 600cc races, well, I needed binoculars to see the start line from where I was on the grid! Seventh place was pretty good all things considered, and a fair summary of the day would be to say we did the best job from a bad situation.”

“The conditions were pretty tough, but they were the same for everyone, so I got stuck in and rode as hard as I could. The team did a terrific job all week so, hopefully, we’ve got all the machine problems and bad luck behind us and we can have a strong TT. It’s the main race of the year for me, and I can’t wait for it to get underway.”

Guy will travel over to the Isle of Man on Monday to prepare for the two-week festival, with the first practice session commencing on Saturday evening. He also has entries in the Classic races at Billown, as well as his five race outings at the TT. The Superbike TT is the first race on the Mountain Circuit, on Saturday 5th June.