Cooper victorious on Sunflower debut\Glenn Irwin donates winnings to William Dunlop family

Buildbase Suzuki rider Richard Cooper yesterday became the 2018 Sunflower trophy winner on his first visit to the event. Cooper led for much of the race but an excursion to the grass midway through saw Tyco’s Michael Laverty take the imitative from Danny Buchan. Cooper rejoined and hunted the pair down before retaking the lead despite the best of efforts of Buchan on the last lap. Following a drag race out of the last hairpin, Cooper won by a slim 0.01 of a second from the Kawasaki of Buchan with Michael Laverty back in 3^rd.

Glenn Irwin’s Sunflower winning ways continued as he won the “Junior Sunflower Trophy” after a terrific battle with Jeremy McWilliams. Irwin lead from the start but, the experienced ex-GP racer McWilliams picked his moment and took the lead after 4 laps. Irwin began his fight back immediately and made his move with 3 laps to go. Irwin on the Burrows Engineering Supertwin never looked back and never gave an inch in the run to the line, not giving McWilliams on the Ryan Farquhar KMR Kawasaki any gap to exploit. Glenn Irwin went 1 better though, by donating his prize money to the family of the late William Dunlop, a feat matched by his sponsors amounting to £4000 in total. 3rd place went to British Junior Supersport champion Eunan McGlinchey who could only look on in the hope that a mistake was made but, the opportunity never materialised. However, McGlinchey did leave the circuit with a new Supertwin lap record of an incredible 1.10.2.

Supersport race wins went to Robert Kennedy in race 1 and 2 with impressive podium places going to Richard Kerr, Aaron Clifford and Jason Lynn. In the USBK championship, Gerard Kinhgan claimed the title with his successful run of results.

In the pre-injection races, Johnny Aiken won race 1 from Johnny Irwin and Jonathan Gregory. While in Race 2 Kevin McGrath took 2^nd place.

Attendance in sunny warm weather was at full capacity as many came to witness the end of the 2018 Short Circuit season at the Bishopscourt track and spectators were treated to a full programme of exciting racing.

Full results available on Speedhive

Words and images – Andy Quinn