Sleaford sidecar racer Gary Horspole earns point finishes at Knockhill

The points accrued at Connell’s home circuit in Scotland took their overall tally to 30 and moved them up to ninth in the rider standings.

Starting the first of three races from an eighth row grid position, Horspole and Connell only got as far as turn one before spinning out.

They were not alone as it soon became clear the track had a trail of oil all around the circuit on the racing line and the race was red-flagged after four laps.

After a lengthy delay the track was cleaned and the race was re-run, with Horspole and Connell forced to start from the back of the 26-strong grid following their early exit.

But they made good progress through the back markers to complete the 15-lap race in 10th.

Horspole said: “We were running in seventh at the start, but spun off the track on the oil that was put down in a solo race. We were doing 100mph-plus at the time so were very lucky.”

In race two the top 10 riders from the first race were reversed on the grid and Horspole and Connell found themselves on pole.

But their position was short-lived as the faster outfits soon relegated them back down the order to sixth.

They held station to the penultimate lap when Chris Walker passed, but Horspole held off the challenge of Bryan and McBride to take seventh place by just a tenth-of-a-second.

Starting race three on Sunday from the second row, Horspole got the LCR Suzuki away to a great start, getting the hole shot into turn one.

But again he and Jimmy were unable to stick with the faster outfits, and on lap two they were down to eighth, and two laps later the Lincolnshire driver found his pace to settle into 10th, holding off McLaurin and Hope by just three-tenths-of-a-second at the flag.

“Once again we found we had the ability but were down on power to the front runners.

“The outfit is going on the dyno this week so hopefully we will be back on song for the next round.”