Scare at the Tourist Trophy: Senior TT red-flagged

There is no peace at the Tourist Trophy this year. The most anticipated race, the Senior TT, was stopped during the second of four laps with the red flag. The riders immediately pulled over along the course. Half an hour after the stoppage, the organizers announced in an official statement that there had been an accident in the 11th Milestone section: the rider, conscious, was assisted and airlifted to the hospital in Douglas. The name of the rider involved has not been released.

The race started at 6:30 p.m. local time (7:30 p.m. in Italy) at an incredible pace. On the first lap, from a standing start, Dean Harrison on the factory Honda CBR-RR came through in 16'44"900 (from a standing start!), just 8 seconds off the absolute Mountain Circuit record set by Peter Hickman on the BMW three years ago. At the first split the Brit had already built a 12-second lead over Hickman himself. With these 250-horsepower bikes blasting along the ultra-fast roads of the Island, these extraordinary and fearless riders are truly breathtaking. Harrison came out of Ramsey for the second time riding like a madman, skimming the walls by a millimeter. The red flag came out while the leader was on the mountain section toward Bungalow.

So most of the riders, at the time of the stoppage, were in the section from Kirkmichael, roughly halfway through the 60.6 kilometers, just past Ramsey. Here are some of the fastest and most fearsome points, like Sulby Straight, where TT-spec Superbikes top 300 km/h. As always in these cases, silence fell over the huge crowd lining the course. The live stream was interrupted. Earlier today the Supersport 2 and the first Sportbike race had run without issues, both won by the legend Michael Dunlop, now at 36 wins on the Isle of Man.

Last week, during Superbike qualifying, Briton Daniel Ingham, 33, died after crashing at Doran Bend in the Glen Helen sector, one of the twistiest stretches, hemmed in by walls and guardrails. During sidecar practice there had been two serious incidents: the first involved Maria Costello, who risks being left paralyzed. The second happened to the Crowe brothers, the favored crew in this class, whose outfit took off and then flipped in the Crosby section at full speed. By sheer luck they escaped with injuries that will heal. There was also a fatality at the pre-TT Classic races, held every year at Billown, a different circuit from the famous Mountain Course. On that occasion, 68-year-old Alan Oversby passed away. Road racing is terribly captivating, but all too often fatal.

Photo: Fabio Armanino

Corsedimoto on Instagram: subscribe here to our news channel