Challenging day at North West 200 as Seeley takes a double

Alastair Seeley has emerged as the main victor after a challenging day for all concerned at the North West 200, with the Tyco BMW rider taking two wins as he matched Robert Dunlop’s all-time win record of five victories.

He first took victory in the supersport race, holding off impressive newcomer Glenn Irwin and Lee Johnston – who was to prove to be his main foil of the day, pushing him hard in both superbike and superstock races.

In fact, they managed to take one apiece, with Johnston holding him off in a dramatic last lap to take his first international big bike win in the superstock race.

Seeley was able to hold him back in the superbike race however, taking the win from a resurgent Ian Hutchinson and perennially strong Bruce Anstey, in a perfect example of his experience around the Triangle course.

In the supertwin class, it was former GP winner Jeremy McWilliams who held off his team boss Ryan Farquhar, with the duo making it a one-two for the KMR Kawasaki team ahead of Jamie Hamilton.

However, the day was blighted with incident, with both the opening superstock race and the final superbike race being cancelled. Red flagged not once but twice, a crash involving Dean Harrison, Stephen Thompson and Horst Saiger has left a spectator critically injured in hospital.

And after fighting heavy showers of rain trying to disrupt the schedule all day, it was eventually high winds that brought a premature end to the day, with the final superbike race being cancelled amid 40mph gusts on the fast parts of the eight mile track.