The Octo British Grand Prix saw Eugene Laverty fly off the line from sixth on the grid in the initial race start as he made it up into second place by overtaking Dani Pedrosa, Marc Marquez, Cal Crutchlow and Valentino Rossi.
However after a red flag Laverty found things more difficult in the restarted race and was unable to repeat his brilliant start. In the shortened second race a collision with Stefan Bradl saw him drop back to last position, though despite damage to his bike he equalled the pace of the top 10 to make his way back to twelfth.
Eugene Laverty: “On the first start, the clutch felt really good off the line, I was fifth into turn one then got past Pedrosa for fourth and then Cal for third. When I passed Rossi for second I thought "this is going pretty good"! A corner later the red flag came out, unfortunately, so I had to do it all again. The clutch didn't feel the same on the second start and then I got hit by a few guys including Iannone in the first corners. I also got locked together with Lorenzo. That sent me backwards and then Bradl collided with me when he crashed.
“Thankfully I didn't go down too but it damaged the rear of the bike and that was it for my race. I had to stick my hand in there and pull the rear mud guard out, which isn't nice with the chain and everything else in there spinning around! It was tough after that but we kept going and picked up four championship points.”
I’d just moved into 2nd past @ValeYellow46 when red flags came out. Should’ve packed up + went home at that point! ???? pic.twitter.com/fbdAWydhlG
— Eugene Laverty (@eugenelaverty) 4 septembre 2016