Brookes denies Bridewell as a furious Redding fails to finish

Josh Brookes has returned to the summit of the British Superbike Championship standings after clinching his sixth win of the season at Cadwell Park, while a furious Scott Redding failed to finish after an incident with Andrew Irwin.

After being beaten to victory in race one by Danny Buchan, Brookes appeared back to form in race two as he stalked early leader Tommy Bridewell for much of the race before striking past and protecting his advantage to the end.

Starting on pole position by virtue of his fastest lap in race one, Bridewell held his position off the line to lead with Brookes and Buchan settling into second and third behind him.

With nothing to separate the trio for the first half of the race, Bridwell simply couldn’t break clear from the sister Be Wiser Ducati behind him. Brookes eventually planted his pass on Bridewell at Park on lap 12 and though the Oxford Racing rider kept him honest all the way to the chequered flag, it was the Australian that’d cross the line first.

It means Bridewell’s extraordinary wait for a first win since 2015 drags on despite him having accumulated 18 podiums since then, ten of which have come in 2019.

Brookes now leads the standings with just one event to go before the Title Showdown gets underway after Redding collided with Irwin on lap two.

Irwin misjudged his braking point coming into Park and came from a long way back to slam into the side of Redding, taking them both out. The incident sparked a furious exchange of words between the pair as Irwin attempted to apologise to an incensed Redding, with the ex-MotoGP rider continuing to express his anger after the race as Irwin attempted to reconcile later.

Despite this, Redding – along with Brookes and Bridewell – is guaranteed through to the Title Showdown, with Irwin arguably the biggest loser as it harms his chances of getting into the top six.

Third place for race one winner Buchan means he is all but assured of a route through to the Showdown too, while Christian Iddon gives himself an outside shot now with his run to fourth.

Peter Hickman was fifth meaning just 10 points cover Mackenzie, Irwin, Hickman and Fores between fifth and eighth. 

Glenn Irwin notched up his best result of the season in sixth position ahead of Ryan Vickers, Luke Stapleford and Fores, with Billy McConnell landing a strong tenth place finish on his guest outing for the OMG Suzuki team. 

Hector Barbera posted marked improvements over the course of the weekend to end the event in 11th, ahead of the recovering Mackenzie, Dean Harrison, Jason O’Halloran – who ran on at turn one – and Dan Linfoot, who also suffered an off that dropped him back.