Local trio set for season opener

THREE local racers are set to start their respective seasons in the British Superbike Championship paddock at Oulton Park this weekend.

Omagh’s Jamie Lyons will compete in the Pirelli National Superstock Championship, while Dungannon’s Adam Brown and Killyman’s Cameron Dawson will both ride in the Quattro Group British Supersport series.

Twenty-year-old Lyons has endured a horrible run of bad luck during pre-season when he’s had his bike basically destroyed during the opening round of the Ulster Superbike Championship before suffering a small off at the final official test at Oulton Park last week.

Having faced a large repair bill after being collected by a falling Ryan Gibson at Bishopscourt, the start to 2025 has been far from ideal for Lyons, who is planning on using the first two rounds as additional test sessions, while attempting to savour ‘small wins’ throughout the season.

“So, the plan is, the first two race weekends are single race weekends, so we’ll treat them as more tests because we didn’t get out to Spain or anything like a lot of other people.

“I’m severely lacking track time, so we’ll use those first two as tests to get into the swing of things to be really comfortable for Silverstone where I know I can do very well.

“I’m not setting myself any targets, I’ll try to be where I should be and the most important thing this year is to try and enjoy it.

“I lacked a bit of that at the end of last year. I started the year quite well and then obviously I had the big crash which wrecked the bike and there were a few things, through no fault of my own, I couldn’t ride the bike the way I wanted.

“It was an issue with a part that caused the issue which was annoying and I couldn’t get the results I wanted and being the kind of character I am, I’m never really happy unless I’m winning. And even when I am winning I’m not happy because I didn’t win by enough!

“I’ve maybe been slightly too driven, so I think I need to take the small wins, so I’ll try to work on that this year, enjoy what I’m doing and the opportunity that I’m being given.”

Dawson, meanwhile, received a timely confidence boost at the final round of pre-season testing.

The Killyman rider endured a difficult baptism onboard his new ROKiT Rookies Kawasaki 636 at Donington Park after enjoying a spin at a private test in Portugal before last week’s third official test at Oulton Park where he began to find his feet.

“It’s been a tough week, a very, very tough week,” he acknowledged. “Donington just didn’t click for me, I really, really struggled.

“I didn’t like the conditions because every time we went out it started to spit so I didn’t have the confidence when it was dry because I didn’t have that grip and I didn’t find that set-up, but that was my first time on that bike with all the new after-market parts that we’re allowed this year.

“So, it was definitely a massive learning curve for me. The pace was nowhere near where it should have been and when I was chasing times and not getting them I was losing confidence.

“It didn’t go so well for me but we got valuable information and data and we discovered what didn’t work.”

Having struggled through the Donington test, Dawson discovered a set-up that worked at Oulton Park on Wednesday and Thursday of last week and he’s now going into round one at the same venue with positivity rather than doubt.

“We tried a lot of different things [at Donington Park] but I came away a little bit disappointed and I didn’t have many positives to take away from it, but coming into the Oulton test, straight away we had a bike that was working,” he beamed.

“We tried so many different things these past two days, it’s been really, really good and I’m really happy with it. I kind of have the chassis in a position now where I feel it’s competitive.

“I’m far happier on the bike, this test has been very valuable and I’m very happy with it.”

While determined to achieve consistent top 10 finishes this season, Dawson admits the first few rounds will be about finding his feet, not only on what is essentially a new bike, but also within a new team, having joined ROKiT Rookies at the end of last term.

“I’ve really made a good connection with my crew chief and I’ve also had Ron [Haslam] working very closely with me this last week, which sped up the process,” he said.

“I’m definitely happier with myself, happy with the bike, the team is starting to come together so my objective this year is to be consistently in the top 10, which is still where I want to be.

“But I also know that the new 636 programme will be a very slow start because it’s a brand new bike and that is why we’re on the back foot because everyone is trying to find as much data as possible.

“But the confidence is there, the happiness is there and now it’s just down to myself.”

And Dungannon teenager Adam Brown is targeting regular points scoring finishes for his new team ahead of the opening round of the Quattro Group British Supersport Championship.

Having endured a tough first season in the series with ROKiT Rookies last term, Brown is confident that he can take what he learned from that experience and turn it into results for Josh Davis Motorsport (JDM) in 2025.

As part of his build-up to the new campaign, Brown has already sharpened his teeth in a race situation by competing in a round of the Spanish Superbike Championship.

And he feels that experience will stand him in good stead ahead of Oulton Park this coming weekend.

“It was amazing, I learned a lot!,” he beamed. “It was a big step going into the ESBK but I learned a lot and it was exciting. But more importantly it was great preparation because it got me into a race before the season even starts. It was great.”

After that Spanish experience, Brown and JDM took part in the two official BSB tests at Donington and Oulton Park, which the 19-year-old found to be useful as he not only gets used to his new surroundings, but also to a new bike after switching from Kawasaki to Yamaha power for the year ahead.

“The team’s amazing, things are a lot better than last year. Things are a lot more focused,” he observed.

“The team is doing a cracking job and I’ve moved onto a Yamaha R6, which I’ve gelled with a lot better. I think it suits me more.”

Surprisingly, Brown is going into only his fourth season of short circuit racing and after a campaign that showed his lack of experience last year, he’s keen to push on in 2025.

“Last year was only my second over there [in the British Superbike Championship paddock] and first on a 600 [cc machine] so it was a big jump,” he acknowledged.

“So this year, we’ll give it the first couple of rounds and then we’ll aim to be consistently in the points after that hopefully.

“It’s about finding consistency this year because the pace will be there in a couple more rounds on the British circuits and we’re hoping for points and then pushing on from there.

“This is only my fourth season at this, so it’s quite surreal because it’s been so quick [to go from Ulster Superbikes to British Superbikes], which is probably why I needed last season just to find my feet really.

“But last year was massively eye-opening because the pace of the front-runners is unbelievable and I learned an awful lot from them, so hopefully I can bring some of what I learned last year into this year and I’ve also learned a lot from this pre-season.

“I’m a lot better rider than I was even at the end of last season and that gives me a nice bit of confidence. I’m really looking forward to the season and I can’t wait for it to kick off.”