National Championship Motorcycle Racing returns to Mondello Park this weekend (10 - 11 May 2008) with a two day which takes place on the National track rather than the International layout normally used for Mondello rounds of the series. The event was originally scheduled to be the second of the three 'Mondello Masters' rounds, but changes to the British Superbike Championship calendar has forced round two to move to the July 6th Clubman event.
In the absence of the Masters Race the Fingal Motor Club will instead run the ‘Race of the Year’ using the same format used for the Masters. Riders for Sunday’s feature race will be chosen following the first round of championship races on Saturday and qualifying for Sunday afternoon’s race will take place as the final session on Saturday evening. The ‘Race of the Year’ is scheduled for 16:10 on Sunday and will be a fifteen lap race contested by the fastest Superbike and Supersport riders.
A full National championship event will accompany the main race with each class racing three times and all races being twelve laps. Qualifying and the first round of races take place on Saturday with a warm up and two more races for each class on Sunday.
Top billing goes to the Irish Superbike Championship which is currently led by Gary Johnston from Brian McCormack, Alastair Seeley and Michael Laverty. With Laverty, McCormack and Seeley all away at the BSB the first of the championship contenders who is entered for this weekend is Declan Swanton giving the Corkman a fantastic opportunity to make up some ground. Jack Kennedy lies just behind Swanton and with the Yamaha R1 Cup not running with the BSB this weekend he will also be on the Mondello grid.
Kirk Jamison and Gerard Kinghan are the next two in the championship standings who will be present and they will be joined in the top six entries by Michael Pearson and Denver Robb. Pearson and Robb both made a hasty return from injury for the last Mondello event but struggled for fitness with neither featuring in the results. With an extra four weeks to recover things should go better for them this time around.
In Supersport many of the riders at the top of the points standings are again missing, leaving Jack Kennedy, Derek Shields and Kirk Jamison as the ones likely to benefit. These riders may also figure in the ‘Race of the Year’ on their Supersport machines as the tight nature of the Mondello national circuit gives little advantage to the more powerful Superbike machinery. Also on the programme this weekend will be races for 250 and 125 GP machines, Minitwins, Pre ’97 and Sidecars.