MOTORCYCLING: Hickman disappointed with Brands Hatch weekend

But because of a few technical issues and tyre problems, Hicky was only able to secure a brace of 11th places in round seven of the championship on Sunday.

The JG Speedfit Kawasaki team worked tirelessly ahead of Brands Hatch to solve the problems they were experiencing and Hicky, who lives near Cadwell Park, was confident of a better showing as they continued to work through practice with the new components and settings.

Hicky continued to make steps forward with each of the three free practice sessions and made it through to the second stage of qualifying to secure 12th place on the grid for the first of the two races.

Starting the 20 lap affair from the fourth row, Hicky was unable to make progress and circulated in 14th position until lap 14 when he made the move up to 13th. On lap 17, he passed Michael Laverty and on the final lap took advantage of Tommy Bridewell’s retirement to secure 11th place at the flag.

Starting the second encounter from the fifth row, once again Hicky was unable to make much headway in the early laps. At the half way stage, he made it through to 12th place and held the position while the safety car was on the track because of an oil spillage.

Because it was close to the end of the race, two laps were added and on lap 20 Hicky passed Broc Parkes to move up into 11th place where he remained through the last two laps to once again to pick up another five championship points to add to the five from the first race, bringing his total haul to 106 to retain his 10th place in the standings.

Disappointed after a tough weekend, Hicky commented: “This was definitely one of our weakest rounds of the year, which is a real shame. It was certainly a big learning curve for us, we tried something for race two but it didn’t really work and we just can’t seem to make use of the bike on a new tyre.

“It’s certainly something we need to look at but we’re still not a million miles away and Cadwell is one of my favourite rounds so I’m confident we’ll be back in the mix over the Bank Holiday weekend.”

Prior to that, Hicky travels to Northern Ireland for the Ulster GP road races where last year he gained his maiden road racing victory by winning the Superbike race.

This time he will be riding the JG Speedfit Kawasaki in the Superbike and Superstock races and the Iron Maiden Trooper Beer Kawasaki in the Supersport event.

Practice takes place on Wednesday and Thursday with racing on Thursday and Saturday.