Honda Racing concludes Donington Park weekend
Donington Park GPRound 8 of the 2025 Bennetts British Superbike Championship (BSB) at Donington Park ended with Honda Racing taking away valuable points and experience for the rest of the season.
The BSB riders faced a three-race schedule for the day, with Andrew Irwin lining up his Honda Fireblade for the first of these 12-lap sprints in fifth on the grid, following his strong performance on Saturday.
Team-mate Tommy Bridewell started from seventh and both riders got away cleanly as the 25-strong field jostled for position in the early laps. Ultimately, the two Fireblades crossed the finish line with Irwin maintaining his fifth place and Bridewell finishing eighth.
Sunday’s second race repeated the team’s grid order with Irwin starting from fifth and Bridewell seventh. Rainfall shortly before the race made for tricky track conditions, and it was Irwin who got caught out on the third lap, crashing at the Goddards chicane. Bridewell had no similar issue and crossed the finish line in seventh place.
The BSB medical team declared Irwin fit to start the final race of the day, but after further consideration, Honda Racing elected to withdraw him in order to help facilitate a full recovery before the next round of the series. Bridewell started from seventh on the grid, climbed as high as fifth in the pitched battle that raged throughout the race, but crossed the line in an eventual eighth place.
“It’s no secret that there is no configuration that we haven’t tried for me to find that ‘thing’ I need from the bike to consistently challenge for wins. We’re in that group just off the podium battle at the moment, and it doesn’t matter if we go hard or soft or high or low or long or short, we just can’t quite get there yet. It’s been a challenging weekend from that perspective and we just need to keep fighting hard, keep up the morale and find a solution. We will just have to see what we can do for Assen.”
“It’s no secret that there is no configuration that we haven’t tried for me to find that ‘thing’ I need from the bike to consistently challenge for wins. We’re in that group just off the podium battle at the moment, and it doesn’t matter if we go hard or soft or high or low or long or short, we just can’t quite get there yet. It’s been a challenging weekend from that perspective and we just need to keep fighting hard, keep up the morale and find a solution. We will just have to see what we can do for Assen.”
“I said before the weekend that we just had to keep a level head and not get too excited and two fifth places were good results in the first two races of the weekend. The team has really been working hard, they built me a great bike again this weekend and sorry to them not to complete the weekend at Donington. I just got caught out by the damp in race 3 and I paid the price for it. I’ve got a little niggle as a result of that crash, so now we’ll take some time and heal up a bit and get ready for Assen.”
“I said before the weekend that we just had to keep a level head and not get too excited and two fifth places were good results in the first two races of the weekend. The team has really been working hard, they built me a great bike again this weekend and sorry to them not to complete the weekend at Donington. I just got caught out by the damp in race 3 and I paid the price for it. I’ve got a little niggle as a result of that crash, so now we’ll take some time and heal up a bit and get ready for Assen.”