The North West 200 - A Storm Is Brewing

Motopod, proudly supported by Roadskin, a UK label specializing in protective outerwear for motorcyclists. Modern biker clothing that you can wear all day long and engineered to save your skin. For the road, for life, visit roadskin.co.uk. For the road, for life, visit roadskin.co.uk. I'm your host, Danny Smith, and this evening I'm joined by my co-host, Carl Hunt.

On this show, we'll be covering current news from all the series, details from the Northwest 200, and what is coming up over the next week or so. Evening, Carl. How are you doing? Done. I'm all right, mate.

Yourself? Yeah, not too bad. Not too bad. Recovering well, so yeah. How is your health now?

Went for a check-up in the week, and they've basically done another x-ray to see what's going on. Didn't get any of the results. They're going to send those through the post. So they're obviously not too concerned. There's a chance of it going again.

If it does, back into hospital, surgery. And then, yeah, could be another week in hospital if it goes again. But yeah, it's just one of those things. They still don't know why it happened. So this is your collapsed lung?

This is the collapsed lung, yeah. And obviously, being in hospital for a week, and then not being able to do anything for the first week, my physio on the shoulders taking a back burner. So the shoulder's sore again. So I'm working on that again. Hopefully get some physio, and then, yeah, just take it step by step, really.

But the other half's in for surgery on Monday. So that's another dilemma. We're all falling apart. This is serious. Yeah, she's got a broken back.

So, yeah. What about you? Anything new? Well, all the best for your other half, mate. I hope the operation goes well.

Nothing bike-related this week, unfortunately. Well, we only recorded last Friday, the last one. And then I've been in Germany this week. We've worked. So, sadly, no bike-related shenanigans this week.

Just trying to catch up on what's been going on. Yeah, yeah. The Northwest 200. I've been watching the footage from that, which we're going to talk about in a minute. Yeah, yeah.

Plenty to talk about on that one. Obviously, Jim and Rich spent two hours moaning about short races on the last podcast, in the MotoGP, Moto2, Moto3. Yeah, I did enjoy Jim and Rich's podcast. Thanks for that, guys. Yeah, they've got a very good point, you know.

Yeah. Although they're the lowest. The Series, Moto3 and Moto2, they should still get the fair shot. Yeah, of course they should. I mean, they're paying to get into these competitions, aren't they?

They're paying a substantial amount of money to have a fair shot at these competitions and to have it cut just because there might be a chance of rain is just ridiculous. Yeah. Bikes aside, it must cost a similar amount to run a Moto2 or Moto3 team to MotoGP other than the out-and-out prototype bikes. Yeah, I think it's... I can't remember.

Is it Moto3 or Moto2? Moto2. They're talking about 300 grand just as the entry. And it's, you know, you've got the bikes on top of that. You've got all these mechanics, all the backroom staff that are working night and day trying to get these bikes ready.

And you get the organisation going, actually, we're going to cut this down. And then you've got the paying fans as well. They want to see racing. Let's not cut it down. But yeah, if you want to hear a good conversation about that, listen to 837 with Jim and Rich.

They definitely put the world to rights on that one. So yeah. Just, I know I mentioned it on the last one because we did a bit of a Cookstown 100 podcast with a bit of a prequel to the Northwest 200. But a bit of a moment of respect for Camille Holan. Like I said, I've mentioned this last time, but it was overshadowed by tragedy to start off with.

On the Thursday during qualifying, first two bike session, Czech rider Camille Holan, 48 years old. He suffered a fatal accident at Station Corner. Obviously the emergency services, the marshals, everyone that attended tried to do the best, but sadly Camille passed away at the scene. There was a discussion with the family afterwards, but they gave a blessing for the event to continue. And the three races that had been planned for Thursday evening were cancelled.

So it was sort of condensed into the six races on the Saturday. Obviously real sad news and road racing community lost one of its own. So whatever we cover in this, this sits above it. And our thoughts remain with Camille Holan's family, friends and everyone in the road racing paddock that knew him. Yeah.

I didn't mention this on the last one, but I went to a fundraiser for one of the Isle of Man TT racers. He's going to be trying to complete all 10 races over there. That's bikes and sidecar. Michael Russell, I spoke to him at the fundraiser and asked him about Camille. He said he was a lovely chap, really good racer, but just so friendly, so down to earth.

So, I mean, he wasn't at the Northwest, but it's obviously shaken them because Camille raced in the Manx. He was a Manx winner. He raced in the TT. So yeah, real sad. But I think the riders and everyone that are involved in these real road racing, they love it.

It's something they are there to do and they wouldn't change anything for the world. And I think if it was the other way around, Camille would want to carry on and race either way. So after that, we'll go into the news. Anything you want to cover straight off the bat? Just really related to road, real road racing and BSB is Davey Todd.

He still remains injured. And we've actually had it confirmed this week. He was ruled out of the Northwest 200 when we discussed it last time. And he's now been ruled out of the TT as well. The TT is only two weeks away now until practice week.

Yeah. So yeah, unfortunately, Davey Todd's ruled out. Yeah. I think there's a bit of a bit of a discussion to be had with that over at the Northwest. He wasn't even seen by the medical staff.

He was just told, no, you're not racing. So obviously, he'd be in his bonnet, rightly so. But he'd been, I think he'd been training, hadn't he? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

He'd been on the bike prior to the Northwest and he said that he could do it. But obviously, medical staff are there for a reason and safety comes first. A couple of things in relation to MotoGP. Jim and Rich covered everything that was there. Marcus's injury.

Surgery's been successful. He's obviously not racing this weekend and not sure when he's going to be back. But it's, he's 71 points behind Buzzecki already. So 70 points behind Martin. Do you see much of a chance of him coming back and doing anything this season?

Mark Marcus. So never say never. Exactly. Exactly. But it's a pretty big hill to climb, that one, that sort of deficit.

Yeah. Especially with that Aprilia looking so strong. Yeah. The Aprilia definitely seems the best all-round bike on the grid now. Yeah.

I must admit, I hadn't picked up on the severity of Mark's injury. Not the one, not the one sustained this time. But he, as the other lads have mentioned on the podcast, you could see that he's not comfortable. But he doesn't appear to be comfortable on that Ducati. Yeah.

So maybe this will straighten him out and he can get comfortable again. Yeah, hopefully. Hopefully. So Ducati are not replacing him this weekend. So it will just be Banyaya at the helm for Ducati.

They knew you were injured, Dan. They didn't call upon you. I think if they're going to call on anyone, mate, it'll be you. Blazing around Alton Park. Too old and fat now.

World Superbike. Obviously, Oliveira's out. He's out with his injury. So they've got Vandermark in. Michelin have confirmed as the tyre supplier in 27.

So they're going to obviously replace Pirelli. And I know we spoke about this a few weeks back in, I think it was the Assen round, with the fuel flow restrictions. Yeah. Ducati have been hit again. 0.5 kilograms per hour.

And Yamaha have been given a plus 0.5 kilograms per hour. So again, we'll see if that makes any difference this weekend. Jake Dixon's set to return. To testing at Misano next week. And Petrucci has also been declared fit for this weekend's race.

British Superbikes. Obviously, there's a certain person that was over in the Northwest 200 that we'll speak about during the podcast. He's returning to BSB this weekend. Glenn Irwin's back as well. And obviously, Max Cook, he's been fast in the test in the earlier rounds, but he topped the Donny pre-season test on multiple occasions.

So it'll be interesting to see what he's like this weekend. And a bit of news about the road racing. I know we mentioned this in the podcast before. Amazon MGM Studios feature film, Isle of Man, starring Channing Tatum and Brad Pitt. That is going to be, well, we don't know what it's going to be like, do we?

But I just hope they do it justice. We've seen racing films before. So just hope they can spotlight the TT for what it actually is. Well, from your shout out last time, the production company, they've been in touch. They've asked me about replacing or being Channing Tatum's new double, stunt double.

So that's in negotiation at the moment. Ah, as long as they're paying well. I've said if you want Channing Tatum to look like me, if you want him to look like me, he's going to have to hit the gym pretty hard. I don't even know who Channing Tatum is. Who is he?

Does he look like you? He was in that male stripper film. I forget what it's called now. Oh, yeah. Magic Mike.

Magic Mike. Yeah. It's on repeat in our house. Is it? All right, OK.

Not Magic Dan. Definitely not Magic Dan. Below par, Dan. Yeah. Just regarding that film, that TT film, it's going to go one of two ways, isn't it?

It's either going to be brilliant or they're just going to get it completely wrong. So let's see. Yeah. You know, it's Amazon. They should be splashing the cash a little bit.

But yeah, don't know how it's going to work out. Don't know what they're doing with the road closures and stuff in between races. We will see. Anything else or on to Northwest 200? I think we can crack on with the Northwest.

OK. So we had qualifying. We had qualifying on Wednesday and Thursday. Obviously, the incident happened with Camille on the Thursday, so the rest of it was cancer. But Glenn Irwin of Nitrous Competitions, he posted the fastest time in the Superbikes.

Michael Dunlop, he was second fastest overall, and Dean Harrison was in third. Storm Stacey of British Superbike, he was sixth fastest on his debut, and then he set the third fastest time in Superstock, qualified fourth in the class overall. He's been amazing. He's been mentored by Michael Rutter, hasn't he? And I think everybody's been saying incredible things about him.

I know all the commentators were a bit worried about him because of how short track-ish he was going around there. And then you had Hickey, Peter Hickman. He was fast throughout, even with the nerve damage that he suffered in Daytona and that big spill that he had in the TT last year. And then Ian Hutchinson had a decent lap that put him in the top six. And he's won the TT 16 times before, so he's obviously pretty handy on these road bikes.

Anything you picked up from the qualifying? Just the order, as you said a moment ago. Yeah, so Northwest 200, as you mentioned. Road race, it's on the nine-mile triangular circuit, Northern Ireland. So you've got Port Stewart, Colerain, Port Rush.

They're the three corners of the triangle, those three towns. Stunning area as well, the weather racing, right on the coast. The weather was pretty savage. It was windy all weekend, made things a bit more difficult, but obviously getting the tailwind, pushing these bikes a bit faster down the straights. Yeah.

So in the qualifying, we had Hickman, Jeremy McWilliams, 62 years old. John McGuinness recently put in motorcycle news that he looked like a shriveled-up tortoise on the bike, including the position that he was riding in. But yeah, so we had race one on Saturday, which was the Super Twin Sport Bike. Jeremy McWilliams took the lead at the start and he held that through the opening two laps. He was on the Yamaha R7, and it was quick down the straights.

By lap three, we had Peter Hickman making his move into Mothers Chicane, and he took the lead from McWilliams. McWilliams immediately responded at, I can never pronounce this one, Magaraboy and retakes first place before the end of the lap. Go on. It's, it's, I was going to say that I know how to say it, but now I don't. It's Mag, Mag, Mag.

Magaraboy. Magaraboy, something like that, yeah. I'm sorry to any Irish listeners. We just, Absolutely, absolutely butcher all this, all these corner names now, I'm sorry. Yes, it, at that, that area of the track, and he retook the first place before the end of the lap.

So it's Jeremy McWilliams in first, Peter Hickman in second. And then on the final lap, Hickman just snuck it at the end from McWilliams. And then Alistair Seeley came in third, Paul Jordan fourth, Jamie Coward in fifth, Christian Elkin in sixth. They were saying, I don't know whether you caught the interviews afterwards, they were saying that the final lap flag wasn't displayed as they went past the start-finish line. So McWilliams didn't realise that it was the last lap.

Okay. And obviously sort of took it a bit easy, thought he had a bit more of a chance if Hickman did come past. And lo and behold, he came past and won the race. I'd have thought he could have counted to four. You'd think so, wouldn't you?

But he's 62. He's, he's getting on a bit now. They're being a bit harsh. Yeah. They are in the heat of battle.

They are. And it is, it is quick. I mean, it's the nine mile circuit. And Hickman was, his average speed was 110.565 miles per hour, which is just insane. Race time of 19 minutes, 23 seconds.

Yeah, it's phenomenal around there. If you haven't watched it, can re-watch it on the iPlayer. Like Carl said previously, for any of our foreign listeners, they will need a VPN to get onto the iPlayer. Fairly easy to do. And it's definitely worth a watch.

Yeah, if you look up bikes, exclamation mark on a BBC iPlayer, you can see the highlights from the Northwest 200. Yeah, because the actual footage itself is a bit laborious to get through. It's all one, like 10 hour stint trying to find bits and pieces. So yeah, stick with the highlights if you can. Then on to your Superbike race one.

So this was a six lap race and this was red flagged and then restarted. So Glenn Irwin returned to the Northwest after a couple of years away. But on lap one, we had the red flag. There was an incident at Church Corner bringing the race to a halt. And because it was such short notice, it was a false restart that was ordered.

Not sure what that incident was. They don't really tell you what's been going on with these incidents very much at the Northwest. No, particularly on this highlights package from the BBC as well. They just say it's a red flag. So apologies to listeners that there's been a few red flags during the race.

And I'm not sure. I'm not sure what caused them. Yeah. And then the restart of lap one, Glenn Irwin led into the first corner with Dean Harrison slotting into second with British Storm Stacey, he was third. And then we've got lap one to three.

Harrison was keeping up with Glenn Irwin and made quite a few attempts to get past in the slipstream on a couple of the bends he tried and succeeded twice at University Corner, but then Irwin just came back past him, squared him off on the end. Exit and re-passed him on the link road straight. It seemed like that bike of Glenn Irwin's was pulling a bit better than that Honda. Dean Harrison made a third pass at Juniper Chicane, but again, Irwin responded and then pulled clear onto Mather's Chicane. Lap three, Storm Stacey on the Batham's AJN Ducati Panigale.

He dropped back from Harrison and he seemed to have a bike issue. Again, not sure what that was. Didn't see any of the coverage that mentioned what actually caused that. I don't know whether you picked up anything. Storm Stacey eventually finished seventh.

And obviously with that, then you've just got Glenn Irwin and Dean Harrison out front. Lap five, Glenn Irwin set the fastest lap of the race. It was a 124.997 miles per hour. And there's a small gap that opened between the two. Harrison reduced it on the final lap and got very close to him towards the line, but couldn't mount the attack to get past him.

Just looking at your notes, Carl, Hutchie had a problem into York Court. Yeah, he just seemed to, he just couldn't seem to slow it down fast enough. So he went into York Corner and he pushed Josh Brooks wide. You've got Stack Corner. Peak speed trap for the weekend was 211 miles per hour.

Yeah, for the Superbikes. That's insane. Absolutely insane. So like I said, Glenn Irwin's a bit of a fan favourite over there. And he won by 0.181 seconds from Dean Harrison, who is yet to win a race over at the Northwest, regardless of the success.

It was Glenn Irwin's 12th Northwest 200 Superbike victory and his first race back. So we had Glenn Irwin, Dean Harrison, Michael Dunlop in third, Peter Hickman in fourth, Josh Brooks in fifth, Ian Hutchinson in sixth, Storm Stacey in seventh, John McGuinness in eighth, Mike Brown in ninth, and Michael Sweeney in tenth. Do you want to cover the Super Sport? Yeah, thanks, Dan. So for the Super Sport, six laps.

Dunlop was leading, actually. He led all the way into lap two. He was followed by Alistair Seeley and Dean Harrison. And Harrison, he passed Seeley down the straight into second place. And that's quite telling because all the other bikes around him were Ducatis, these V2s, the 959 Ducatis.

But Harrison's only on a 600. But it didn't seem much wrong with the speed of the Honda 600 because he was able to pass them down the straight. And the highest top speed, actually, through the speed traps at the weekend for a Super Sport bike was 187 miles an hour. I think that was one of the Ducatis. And I still consider the Ducatis a cheat in a bit with the old 959 engine.

But there you go. Then later on in the lap, Cooper, he made a big mistake at university. And he nearly goes straight, but he turns in wide and up onto the pavement. But he pushes Paul Jordan out onto the pavement as well. So he causes them both to lose a lot of time.

Moving into lap four, Cooper then comes back from that mistake from the previous lap. And he actually catches Seeley and pushes him back into fourth. And it's pretty static. Apart from lap five, Cooper had a massive moment on the brakes into that Mill Road roundabout. And then he hit Paul Jordan and wipes them both out on the roundabout.

I think he just seemed to be just too late on the brakes. And Cooper's bike was snaking sideways. And yeah, he just collected Paul Jordan. They both went down. And that caused the race to be red flagged.

So it was called after five laps instead of six. Yeah, that's the thing. It's a 50% on this one, isn't it? It's a complete 50% of the race. Then they call it on the red flag.

Yeah, so we had Dunlop, Harrison, Brooks, Seeley, Phillips, Rhys Brown, Herbertson, Behan and Michael Evans, 10th. So on to the CP Higher Superstock race. This race was another one that was red flagged across the weekend. Storm Stacey had been leading early on. But he ran on at University, which dragged Richard Cooper in as well.

Richard Cooper. He had crashed and he slid into a grass bank. Cooper was unhurt, but the track needed to be repaired. Cooper, who had been fighting Stacey for the lead, couldn't take the restart. The restarted race was four laps rather than the six that had been planned.

Dean Harrison, who was leading the original race, he retired on lap two of the restart with a mechanical problem. And then this paper. Stacey, who was leading the original race, was out of the race for a three-way battle between Storm Stacey, Michael Dunlop and Josh Brooks. There were frequent changes to the lead all through the race. But Stacey managed to outbrake Michael Dunlop on York Corner, who then reeled him back in at 300km an hour plus run down towards Colerain.

Stacey retook the lead back at the Magic Roundabout on the final lap. Stacey made his move at the Metropole Corner. And shortly after this, Dunlop's BMW slid at the same spot. It looked like he made a mistake at the exit. And it nearly threw him out of the saddle.

He'd lost momentum, which briefly let Josh Brooks through. But then Dunlop came back and reclaimed second place at the Juniper Chicane. Storm Stacey won this race with a new class record of 124.498mph. Stacey became the 27th rider in the North West history to win a race on his debut. The last one before this was Christian Elkin in 2007.

And then so we had Storm Stacey, Michael Dunlop, Josh Brooks, Ian Hutchinson, John McGuinness and Mike Brown completing the top six. But what a race Storm Stacey. I mean, just incredible. First real road race competition. And he takes first from Michael Dunlop.

Yeah. He does. He definitely didn't look out of place, did he? No, not at all. Not at all.

That short circuit stuff really comes into play down that coastal road. He was really opening up a big gap on the pack there. But yeah, cracking result for him. Seems to be a real nice bloke as well. Yeah.

And he lives eight miles from me. There you go. Nice and local. Pop round, cup of tea. Yeah.

Interview. Happy days. For this Superstop race, Storm was actually running the BMW instead of the Ducati. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Was this the race where he had to swap bike as well? I remember one of the races he had to swap bike. I think it might have been the previous one. Yeah.

So he had to swap bike because there was an issue at the start line with his. And then he had to ride Michael Rutter's bike because they just put the sticker on top of Michael Rutter's. But yeah, obviously, I don't think it was that race. I think it was the previous race. Sorry, Dan.

Was that the first Superbike race? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. His bike packed up on the line.

So they had to swap the bike over because of the red flag. He was allowed to use the other bike. Right. So results from that one was Storm Stacey in first, Michael Dunlop in second, Josh Brooks in third, Ian Hutchinson in fourth, John McGuinness in fifth. Great ride from him.

In sixth, Mike Brown. Seventh, Dominic Herberton. Eighth, Marcus Simpson. Ninth, Mitch Rees. And in tenth, David Johnson.

Jump into the next race then, mate. Okay. So next race is the... Super Twin slash Sportbike Race 2. Start of the lap.

Hickman led off the start with McWilliams in second, Sealy in third. McWilliams did manage to come past Hickman in second on the straight after York Corner. Jordan gets the toe on Hickman and then passes him into third place at Magra Boys Chicane. Jordan goes wide at the exit and has to jump over the grass. So he did a bit of...

He almost looked a bit motocross-esque with his jump over the curb and onto the grass. And that's... So obviously that knocked him back a bit. And Hickman overtook Jordan into the Juniper Chicane to get into second place. Pretty static racing until the start of the final lap.

When Hickman was... He was closing in on McWilliams. McWilliams had been quite far out in front for the duration of the race. But Hickman was starting to close him down. And actually coming out of the first turn of the final lap, McWilliams hit the curb hard out of the first corner.

He actually went up onto the curb. So, yeah. But he still got a good drive down the straight. And he managed to stay in first place. Then down into the next corner, York Corner, Hickman ran wide and let Jordan through.

So it looked like he had an issue. But then shortly after that on the straight, his bike broke down. So Hickman got a DNF for that. And then it was fairly static to the finish of the Super Twin race. As we mentioned, first was Jeremy McWilliams.

Second, Paul Jordan. Third, Alistair Seeley. Fourth, Jamie Coward. Fifth was Franco Bourne. Sixth, Christian Elkin.

Seventh, Alan Venter. Eighth, Joey Thompson. Nine, Andrea Maggiola. And tenth was Dominic Herbertson, Dom the Bomb. Dom the Bomb on a grom.

Yeah. Have you seen the images on social media of McWilliams up on that curb? Yeah. Oh, his wife was not happy when he got back into Park Firm, was she? Yeah.

A little bit of colourful language used by her. Yeah. Cracking race. 62 years old and still doing what he's doing. Incredible.

Yeah. He hit the curb. And it's... Like a bunny hop over the... Yeah.

And then he still got a great drive down the straight. Yeah. How he stayed on that, I'll never know. But, yeah, impressive from the ex-MotoGP winner. Assen, wasn't it?

I think that one was. Did he win? Yeah. Did he ever win? He won one race and I'm almost sure it was Assen.

Ah, I think I remember. Was it raining? And it was the... Yes. Was it the three-cylinder two-stroke?

Yeah. What a result for that man. And he had speed of 111 miles an hour. Yeah. Incredible race.

Incredible. And then on to the final race of the Northwest 200. This one was red-flagged again, wasn't it? But on lap one, we had Richard Cooper and Storm Stacey leading into York Corner at the start. Glenn Irwin was there as well.

But Storm pushed Glenn Irwin wide. So he was shuffled back into around about sixth place. Dean Harrison. He was in the leading group and he overtook Storm into Maghreboy Chicane. Maghreboy.

He'll be fluent by the end of this podcast. I don't know about that. And then Storm outbraked Dean Harrison into Juniper Chicane and he took back first place. On lap two, Harrison slipstreamed Storm on the straight between station and university corner. And he passed Storm into first place at just over about 200 miles an hour.

The footage is phenomenal. The speed that they get in that slipstream. And as soon as they pop out, you can just see the drag that they get. Glenn Irwin passed Dean Harrison to take second at university corner. And then Glenn Irwin then passed Storm into first position on the straight leading up to Maghreboy Chicane.

And then Stacey passed Irwin into first on the coast road. So that's the sort of short circuit area that we were talking about where Storm Stacey just surpassed everything. And then on lap three, Storm looked like. He had a bit of a moment breaking into York Corner. Just managed to hold it and hit the apex.

And then on the straight just before university corner, Storm gets passed by Irwin and Harrison. So it's very to and fro with this three at the front. You can see in the footage that the front of the bike pulls up and he loses a lot of time on that one. Looked impressive, but I don't think I'd want to be doing it at the speed that he was doing it. Yeah, it was a good wheelie.

But it looked like the commentators even mentioned it looked like the air got under the aero on the front of that BMW. And instead. Instead of getting downforce, he actually seemed like he got lift. Yeah, one of them said, didn't they? As soon as it gets over a certain angle, that wind will catch under that wing and just sort of try and pick you up, which it seems is what happened to Storm.

So you could actually physically see him rolling off. Storm then passed Irwin and Harrison on the brakes into Mathers Cross. So he got back into first. Then Harrison passed Storm and Glenn Irwin into first using the slipstream on the straight before. You keep putting this word in.

In the notes for me. Magra boy. Magra boy. Storm passed Irwin into second somewhere before Metropole. Storm then passed Harrison into Juniper Chicane.

So lap three, at the end of lap three, we had another red flag. And this was down to an oil spill at the Juniper Chicane. And obviously the distance had already passed. So the race was declared with Storm Stacey winning that race. This one brought up a bit of a.

Another conversational point. Did you see the marshals standing in the road, guiding these bikes around the oil spill? No, no. Absolutely insane. They were, there was like, instead of putting cones out or, you know, let's all wave the flags and keep them out of the way.

They put marshals in the road and they were all stood there like linking arms, waving these bikes past and just these bikes are tearing past them. Get the double yellows out, make it a bit easier for them, but no. So yeah, Storm Stacey winning the second race. Now I don't think that anybody had done this before as a rookie, but in this one we had Storm Stacey in first, Dean Harrison in second, Glenn Irwin in third, Peter Hickman in fourth, Brooks in fifth, Ian Hutchinson in sixth, John McGuinness in seventh, Mike Brown in eighth, Carl Phillips in ninth, and Michael Evans in tenth. That was, it's pretty incredible, isn't it?

The racing over there. Didn't have the best weather for it. Severely windy over there. But yeah, very windy. Well, very windy for the whole weekend, I think, or for the whole day of Saturday.

But this last race, you know, the Blue Ribbon Race to Northwest 200. This is what the Northwest 200 is named after, this final race. As you've said, the amount of passing in that last lap between Storm and the other guys, you know, passing in chicane, passing on the straight, slipstreaming. Yeah, it's just brilliant. He didn't look like a rookie.

He just, he looked like he belongs there. And obviously there was talk afterwards of, is he going to win? Is he going to be at the Isle of Man TT? But he's definitely not entered into it this year. Um, potentially the Manx maybe?

I don't know. No, I don't think it's ever going to happen for Storm Stacey to get to the Isle of Man because before his father died, he said to his father, he never raced on the Isle of Man. Oh, really? Yeah. So it's pretty certain that he's not going to do that.

Yeah. Ah, interesting. Um, but obviously over the weekend, there was a load of top hats sold and people, I mean, the cheers that he was getting over there was really good to see. So race. Winners for all six races.

We had the Super Twin, Peter Hickman, Superbike, Glenn Irwin, Superstock, Storm Stacey, Supersport, Michael Dunlop, Super Twin Race 2, Jeremy Williams and the Superbike Race 2, Storm Stacey. Yeah. Storm Stacey was indeed the first debut double winner of the modern era. And he was awarded the Robert Dunlop Best Newcomer Award and the Best Competitor Award. And he's the only rider to ever win both in the same year.

Then Glenn Irwin had his 12th Northwest Superbike victory. Consecutive Superbike winning streak that was unbroken since 2017 ended at 11. Michael Dunlop won the Supersport race for his ninth Northwest victory. And this is one of the very few Northwest weeks where he hasn't won a Superbike race. Normally very, very proficient in these.

Jeremy McWilliams was the man of the weekend by popular acclaim. Well, you saw the way he was. He was waving to all the crowd and fans around there. Yeah. Peter Hickman, he won the Super Twin Race, but he's still waiting for his Superbike victory at the Northwest.

But even returning after the nerve damage at Daytona, obviously the big off in the TT, he's looking competitive. Dean Harrison, felt a bit sorry for him with the red flags. They just came at the wrong time for him. He's still yet to win a race over the Northwest. Yeah, he still hasn't broke his duck.

No. And he's always up there. He's always up there. He is superb. Great guy as well.

Really funny. I think he's looking potentially the strongest for the TT now. I think so. Yeah, I think so. Definitely.

Dunlop's had a bit of a struggle with the bike, hasn't he? So it'll be interesting to see what happens. Yes, we had seven red flags. And yeah, that's about it from the Northwest, I think. It's good over there.

And they had the, I don't know if she was the deputy prime minister or what she was, but she was one of the leading politicians over there. She was the head of the local government, as well. Yeah. She was the one that was actually the best one to create trouble, and they were the ones that were the strongest. Yeah.

So they were the strongest. So, yeah. They were the strongest. It might be a bit interesting. Yeah.

So, yeah, that was a great story, but I think it's a bit of a shock, from the standpoint of a legend, perhaps, when you don't really support it. You know, history's coming after the tragic incident. But they are fully behind it. And that's what we need more of. You know, you look at the press, you look at the government.

that's bigger than the northwest in northern ireland yeah and you could see it everywhere was full wasn't it the grandstands were full and they said that it was baltic over there but you still had people just cheering them all on um it's great to see and you know the tt will be the same it's going to be absolutely rammed you won't be able to find a seat in space it's just one of those sort of competitions that draws everybody in but yeah it's a shame we can't get a bit more support from the powers that be so the tt starts in 10 days glenn irwin's not entered into the tt he seems to favor the northwest 200 michael dunlop and the ducati v4r that he was on first outing on the roads in the northwest but obviously the tt is going to be a real test for that one and apparently i don't know can the panigale v4r win a superbike tt for the first time since mike halewood in 1978 here's a little fact you can't win a superbike tt for the first time since mike halewood in 1978 you can't win a superbike tt for the first time since mike halewood in 1978 here's a little fact okay come on start my soon-to-be father-in-law has recently been up to mike halewood's grave because he is a relation of mike halewood okay there you go he doesn't ride like mike halewood i'm not gonna lie but um yeah he'll be the first to tell you that um hickman has obviously still got the outright tt lap record uh the speed which was 135.452 miles per hour um there's i think there's probably going to be a few more this year with the bikes that are getting over there and the um just how things are improving and i just hate to get good weather this year so do i yeah it was terrible last year wasn't it yeah really compresses the time schedule uh the issue is on the isle of man if it's wet they just don't race at all they historically they did but now because for safety reasons it's a 37.7 mile circuit you can have some dry bits some wet bits if it's raining so there's no racing unless it's unless the whole course is dry and that's the thing isn't it the size of the bike is going to be a lot of work and i think that's going to be the track you can be racing down bray hill and it's dry and then you go up the mountain and it's torrential rain and it is it causes carnage over there but hopefully it'll be a bit different the manx last year lovely weather we had a couple of showers but yeah the most of it was absolutely fine yeah it's just luck of the draw with the tt but like i say there's a lot of a lot of time and effort and money goes into this competition and for the riders to not get the full couple of weeks of riding is um it's a real shame but yeah we'll um we'll keep our eyes open for that i did sign up to the tt pass so have all the footage of that so yeah i think we'll um plan is to cover a bit of a preview show for the tt yeah so me and you dan will we'll do a tt preview show uh we might have to wait wait a couple of weeks or we might have to do it in the same week as practice week because this weekend we've got a very busy racing schedule with bsb donington world super bikes in the czech republic and then jim and rich will be covering moto gp from barcelona and jake and scott will be covering moto america from barbara so yeah hectic weekend so we'll just have to delay the the tt show a bit but we will do one yeah i think so um how are we going to work that this weekend coming up um don't know we'll have a discussion try and uh make a bit of a plan but obviously jim and rich's most recent was two hours if we had our hour on top of that and then jake and scott's moto america on top of that as well we'd be here all day so we'll come up with a plan schedule something in um and obviously everything will be on the socials coming up official underscore motor pod on on most of them um previous still online you can go and listen to those um head over to moto podcast.com if you've got any feedback or any questions get in touch with us at moto gp od at moto gp od.com there you go just uh sorry dan one more comment just about the isle of man tt yeah if people do want to do want to watch the isle of man tt you can buy the tt live pass um in english money so in sterling i think it's 23 yeah 23.99 yeah we did share a chat earlier in the host whatsapp group because there's actually a discount code a 20 discount code it's 44 the number's 44 tt the letters tt and then 20 that's a limited code it's actually been bought out by the youtube guides 44t but i think you and i've used it yeah so if you want to get the tt live pass and you want to try and get 20 off use that code yeah you mentioned 44t um the fundraiser that i went to at the weekend michael russell road racing he had al fagan there yeah obviously 44t he was there those guys they could be a comedy double obviously a tt rider himself it's good to see and they did a lap of john mcginnis but we offered them the mug with all the directions on there just so they knew their way around yeah definitely worth a watch it it's an incredible racing event um very popular very busy and just incredibly talented people over there it's not like anything else is that there's nothing else in the world that i think comes near to what they do on those races now i'm looking forward to watching it as i mentioned in a previous podcast i will be in italy at the time for magello moto gp so it'll be tough it'll be tough to decide between watching uh moto gp live or watching a bit of tt on the tt live yeah when do you go over there when you're flying uh not this week the week after the end of the following week i think we get there thursday evening nice and then we're going to be friday saturday sunday at the track and then we've got four extra days after that in italy oh so uh live streaming and we'll have to keep up with the socials on that one then yeah i'm not gonna i'm not gonna read out my address so nobody burgles me i should advise i've got high high tech security in my house and a big dog oh well i've got a dog she's not very big but i think that's pretty much it from us um busy weekend of racing make sure you get on to um tnt sports have a watch of all of that stay safe out there and we'll see you all after the racing at the weekend carl any closing words no thanks for that dan no worries we'll catch you next time cheers so so so you Thank you. Thank you.