Showers has podium finish at Silverstone

Two of Bermuda’s promising  motorcycle riders did the island proud on the at the fabled Silverstone Raceway in England.

Wytico Showers and Jazari Caisey were given invites to participate at the legendary track.

Caisey finished the first practice session last Friday in 19th place. His next race was marred by a crash as he did not have rain tyres.

Showers secured rain tyres in time for his turn on the track.  He was hooking it up with a 125cc rider who was pushing him to his limit. Unfortunately a lack of racing in the rain experience saw him crash out too, but the work put in secured him the fastest time of the day in the 80cc classification.

Caisey qualified sixth in the grid and Showers qualified fifth in the class mixed with 125cc and 80 cc bikes.  On Saturday, the sun was out and the boys were at the track early. The team got busy making adjustments as the bikes were not running optimally.  Caisey had a sticking clutch while Showers’ bike was lacking on the top end and with only one practice session to get thing sorted.

 In the race, Caisey’s 6th place grid position saw him starting from the second row but his clutch problems prevailed and he slipped to the back of the pack on takeoff.

Riding hard, he worked his way up to 17th position where he finished the race.

 In the 80cc/125cc race, Showers was lined up on the outside of row five and got a good start but tangled with a 125cc rider in turn one, which set him back slightly. Back in the race, he entered a heated battle for third and this battle continued for most of the race laps until he and the other rider continuously swapped positions till Wytiko was able to make the pass stick securing himself a third place finish.

For Sunday's event Caisey got another bad start as clutch problems hampered him.  Having to recover the positions lost and with the lead pack pulling away, he rode hard managing to work his way back up to 17th position when the checkered flag flew.   Race 1 for Showers saw him also get off to a bad start.  He was unable to make up the ground lost - the team knew the bike was not running right going into the race — during the race Showers kept gesturing to the team that he could not get anything more from the bike. 

In the second race the team re-geared the bike and richened up the jetting and this helped Caisey get off to a good start.  

By turn two, the aggressive riding of the older riders shuffled him back, but he fought hard to stay with them and finished in 15th position. 

When the flag dropped, Showers battled with the leaders for several laps before getting caught up in another to-and-fro with an Italian rider that allowed the leaders to open up a gap. He was determined to close the gap, passed the rider on the outside and the rider hit him sending him off the track causing him to lose more ground.  Showers fought back hard.  It took five laps and he was back in the battle. Unfortunately the Italian rider hit Showers back wheel on the white flag lap, knocking him out of the race.

Overall, Caisey won a prize recognising him for his efforts through the weekend's events to go along with Showers third place finish.