Mixed fortunes for Honda Racing UK at Brands Hatch

Glenn Irwin

Qualifying was good and we tried the new Pirelli rain tyre, but it wasn't what we expected and perhaps we needed a different setting, so a quick pitstop gave us the chance to try and get up there on the grid and we managed eighth. The race was good fun, and our pace at the end was quite comparable to the likes of Jason [O'Halloran] during the last few laps, which is a huge step from when we were here last time. The race was throughly enjoyable, I felt good, the shoulder is what it is and I'm starting to use my body to compensate the weakness, but it was enjoyable and was nice to be battling with the right riders at Brands Hatch.

Race 1: 9th

Ryo Mizuno

It was an unfortunate opening race for us. I crashed early in FP2 yesterday, and today I had to retire from the race with a broken shifter. It's been a difficult session all weekend but tomorrow is the end of the season, and I'm looking forward to giving it my all.

Race 1: DNF

Takumi Takahashi

I didn't have a good feeling during qualifying in the wet and I couldn't get a good lap time. In Race 1 we made some improvements with the swingarm that we've been using since the last race at Donington, and I was able to ride consistent lap times, although we still need more. Tomorrow for Race 2 I will start from a better grid position than today, so we will try to make even better steps.

Race 1: 17th

Tom Neave

We've had really good speed in the dry across the weekend and on the practice combined times we were second fastest, I felt really good and everything was working really well, but we got caught out in qualifying today. It was spitting for 3/4 of the session and dried up with about eight minutes to go, and unfortunately we didn't get the tyres swapped in time. No one was to blame - it was just one of those unfortunate things that hampered my qualifying position. On dry times we were second fastest and tomorrow we're starting the race 19th, which clearly doesn't reflect any of our speed or pace this weekend in the dry. My start position tomorrow will make an entertaining race, and we'll try to turn it into a positive.