MOTORSPORT: Kinsale’s Stephen Tobin ends successful season on a high

BY MARTIN WALSH

HAVING secured the Moto 400 title in the previous rounds, Kinsale’s Stephen Tobin (Yamaha FZR) completed the category in the Dunlop Masters Superbike Championship series (15 races) unbeaten when he won all three races at Mondello Park last weekend that brought the curtain down on the series.

In addition, Tobin finished second in the Supersport Cup on board his Kawasaki ZX6R.

Tobin, who won the Moto 400 series in 2019 and was leading last year’s campaign until it was halted by Covid-19, was the star of this year’s series.

With the title wrapped up prior to last weekend, his goal was to finish the season unbeaten and while he measured his victory in Saturday’s first race with a 3.894 second winning margin, he coasted to wins in the remaining pair of races where he took the chequered flag with 33.148 seconds and 34.370 seconds in hand of the opposition.

In the Supersport Cup he finished with a win and two second place finishes that secured second overall in the series behind Ballyhooly’s Jamie Collins in his DJ Racing run Yamaha R6.

In qualifying, Tobin twice parted company with the Kawasaki in the very wet conditions, however, the track had dried considerably for the races.

Afterwards, Tobin said, ‘I’m delighted, to be honest, I would have been happy with third. We made a few small changes to the bike, softened up the rear shock and dropped the front a few millimetres and it made a big difference to the handling.’

With the racing scene over for the year, he gave a brief glimpse of his plans for 2022.

‘The Manx GP, I competed there in 2017 and it went horribly wrong, I crashed during practice. I want to go back there, as they say, I want to scratch that itch.’

Tobin added that he will use his Kawasaki on the Isle of Man. As for his Yamaha FZR, ‘Oh, I will keep that, it’s a cracking bike, I will use it in road races, I will refresh the engine over the winter.’

Elsewhere, Bandon’s Derek Wilson had his final races on his Suzuki GSXR that he sold after the final race. Killeady’s Jeff Quilter had a disappointing outing in the Moto1 series and in his second series of races in the Supersport Cup, Lyre’s Donal O’Donovan finally took his Yamaha FZR to a race finish.

O’Donovan finished tenth in Sunday’s second race. Despite moving away from the Moto1 series, he had enough points to claim second overall in the series with Killeady’s Jeff Quilter third.

Meanwhile, Bandon’s Derek Wilson (Suzuki GSXR) finished sixth in the championship after taking seventh, sixth and seventh in his trio of races.

‘I actually sold the bike after the last race. At the start of the year I was looking at a top eight, so to come sixth was great. The highlight was my fourth place finish in the previous round of three races where I also had a PB. This weekend my times were a bit scrappy and I was boxed in really. Over the winter I will weigh up my options for next season.’

In the Sidecars, Kinsale’s Mark Gash had a race win as passenger with Wexford’s Darren O’Dwyer, the pair finished second overall in the series.