Shakey Byrne bestowed the title of ‘The Smiling Assassin’ on Rhys Irwin after his second podium of the weekend at Thruxton Race Circuit over the weekend.
And how the Kilmacrennan rider lived up to this title as he smiled from ear to ear maintaining second place in the British Superbikes premier Supersport Championship with P3 in Race 1 and P2 in Race 2.
The weekend brought mixed conditions with heavy rain for Friday’s qualifying with unpredictable track conditions.
Rhys raced a safe race with the Championship in his sights he made no error in taking the Suzuki home in P3 following a stewarts enquiry resulting in another competitor being disqualified from the race results due to an infringement of the rules.
Sunday saw clear skies and Rhys racing his heart out from flag to flag.
Never before was this class so overflowing with talent with multiple racers swapping the lead lap by lap. In the final laps it came down to Currie, Irwin, Booth Amos and Staplefort with Rhys leading into the final 2 laps.
A false neutral pushed Rhys wide opening a gap for Currie to take the chequered flag with tenths of seconds between the racers Rhys followed Currie over the line followed by Booth Amos and Staplefort.
A clear favourite with the commentators Rhys admitted that he was just delighted with his results in his post race interview and that he was having the time of his life with a great team and a great bike.
“I’m not going to lie I am so, so happy with my results this weekend. I am just so grateful for all the backing from my sponsors my journey would not be possible without them.
“I am just so delighted with all the messages of support that I am getting from the fans and I read every one of them.”
Rhys moves on to Round 8 in 2 weeks time at Brands Hatch.
