| Conor
Cummins
The date was May 13th; the venue was the Triangle
Circuit, home of the North West 200, the event and the
start of Conor Cummins’ real road race career.
Conor was just 19 years old at the time and was riding
a 1000cc machine for only the fourth time in his short
career.
To put his performance into perspective, twelve months
previously a guy called Cameron Donald made his debut
at the North West 200, taking 12th and 13th place finishes
with a fastest lap of 116mph. Cameron is currently the
talk of road racing and billed as the next big thing.
On his debut, Conor took 9th and 14th place finishes
with a fastest lap of over 117mph. In fact he averaged
over 117mph in the Superstock Race! During the course
of the day he beat established road racers like Davy
Morgan, Carl Rennie, John Burrows, Adrian McFarland,
Phil Stewart, John Barton, Tim Poole, Denver Robb –
oh and Cameron Donald!
In the Superstock race, Conor finished almost a minute
ahead of the next best newcomer – AMA Superbike
rider, Macau Grand Prix podium finisher and vastly experienced
Mark Miller on a TAS Suzuki. Battling with the likes
of Ian Lougher, Les Shand, Ryan Rainey and Stephen Thompson
at the North West was a sign of things to come for the
laid back Manxman.
Conor excelled on his debut at the TT, finishing inside
the top twenty in the Senior Race, with several laps
at over 120mph on his way to claiming the Newcomers
Award, presented to him by the great Giacomo Agostini.
From that point on Conor went from stunning debut to
stunning debut at the majority of Ireland’s road
race venues, not to mention putting in some top draw
performances at Billown, at both the Steam Packet Races
and Southern 100.
The highlight of his year, however, were his performances
at the Ulster Grand Prix, which started with a dominant
win in the Newcomers 600cc Race and was followed by
a second behind Keith Amor in the 1000cc Newcomers Race.
Conor would enjoy on-track battles with experienced
campaigners like John McGuinness, Martin Finnegan, Ryan
Farquhar and Jason Griffiths on the main race day which
started with a magnificent seventh in the Superstock
Race, followed by ninth in the first of two Supersport
Races. The highlight of the day came in the first Superbike
Race, however, with Conor coming home a brilliant seventh
despite being down on power riding his Superstock spec
Yamaha. An eighth followed in the second Supersport
Race before rounding out an excellent days work with
his only finish outside of the top ten, that being 11th
in the second Superbike Race.
Still just 20, Conor starts the 2007 season as one
of the men to beat at National level with further success
likely at the main International events, where he will
campaign a Superbike for the first time. Friendly, modest,
professional and massively talented, Conor Cummins is
likely to be around for a long time to come. |
