The Voice of Spalding and South Holland
Saracens Head race ace Ben Stafford suffered a devastating blow in round seven of the Dickies British Supersport event at Brand Hatch.
Stafford was involved in a high speed crash at the Sheene curve and his Kawasaki was totally destroyed as a result after his bike cartwheeled over.
Another rider had no option but to hit the bike in the track and, as a result, it’s now irreparable due to the damage sustained.
This was the second time in three meetings that the 20-year-old had suffered damage to his bike.
And, although uninjured, Stafford will struggle to get the machine rebuilt and tested in the 18-day slot available to round eight at his favourite track of Cadwell Park due to financial constraints and the team travelling to Ulster this week to compete in the Ulster GP. A decision will be made later this week on what course of action to take.
Stafford and his Silicone Engineering team had failed to get a setting in the two free practice sessions and, at the end of day one, had to make some changes overnight to try to improve the end result.
Qualifying came and, although bettering his best time at this circuit by almost a second, he found himself down in 20th place on the grid for Saturday’s sprint race.
Stafford, in a bid to move up positions, made some changes to the set up just before this race and on the grid was confident that they would be for the better.
He made a good start from the lowly 20th spot and after two laps had moved up to 14th place, but two laps later the high speed crash ended his meeting.
