Sidecar pair warm up for Isle of Man TT with Mallory Park win

Championship leaders Jev Walmsley and Pete Founds had a pair of top-two finishes for the second consecutive round EMN-180517-151851002

They headed to the Leicestershire circuit for round three of the ACU FSRA British Sidecar Championship

After a mechanical problem affected practice, the pair headed into qualifying with few laps under their belt, but were on the pace from the off with a new set-up, first tried out at a wet Cadwell.

A blistering lap of 56.006secs (average 89.34mph) gave them a second pole position of the year.

A wheelspin at the start allowed John and Jake Lowther to pass them before Gerrards, but Pete and Jev soon retook the lead at the start of lap two before an incident on the next lap saw the race red-flagged.

From the restart, the Lowther brothers again took the lead from the off, but Pete and Jev were right on their tail before the chicane, chasing them down before moving ahead at the end of the second lap.

With no further stoppages, Pete and Jev set a pace which the rest of the field could not match, crossing the line to take the win by more than three seconds, also with the fastest lap (avr 88.86mph).

With a reverse grid for the top six finishers going into race two, Pete and Jev took up their position on the third row of the grid.

But a great start took them up to second behind Hegarty and Neave as a tightly-group pack headed to the chicane.

Hegarty was pushing hard at the front, but Jev and Pete were in their slipstream on lap four and blasted down the start/finish to take the lead, only for Hegarty and Neave to fight back and regain the lead at the chicane.

On lap five, Pete and Jev passed Hegarty/Neave into the lead and tried to pull out an advantage.

Despite a lack of grip, they pulled out a two-second gap as Crawford/Hardie joined the battle at the front.

As mid-race, Pete was battling issues with the controls, while the heat played havoc with the outfit, and these combined to affect their pace.

After dispatching the second and third-placed outfits, the Suzuki of Crawford/Hardie passed Pete and Jev on lap 13 as they were slowed by a back marker which then split the leading pair.

They managed to stick with the new leaders, but Crawford/Hardie took the win by half-a-second.

With Crawford/Hardie not scoring in race one, Jev and Pete still lead the championship with 10 races still to contest.