K-Tech Irving Vincent Team riders Beau Beaton and Cam Donald score solid points to ensure Team Australia claim victory in the International Challenge at the 27th International Island Classic.
The K-Tech Irving Vincent team has started 2020 in style, while debuting a new short stroke engine configuration. Beau Beaton and Cam Donald finished all four International Challenge races in strong positions to help Team Australia to a 15 point victory over Team USA in the 12th International Challenge at the International Island Classic at Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit over the weekend of 24- 26 January.With Beau having not raced since being involved in a serious crash in the first race of the 2019 International Challenge, Thursday practice was his first opportunity to sample the new 1400cc short stroke push rod V-Twin engine design Ken and Barry Horner had developed to try and decrease the power deficit against the 1300cc four cylinder monsters in the challenge races. Cam had only done limited testing but was mounted on “Old Faithful”, the original 1300cc pushrod V- Twin that he has ridden before and that has also seen much success at previous events.
Ken and Barry Horner had been working for months on preparing the crowd-pleasing equipment in the workshop for this year’s event which is one of the biggest and most prestigious classic bike meetings in the world.
The K-Tech Irving Vincent Team was also lucky to have, all the way from the UK, K- Tech Suspension’s Product Development Technician James Harpham on hand to assist with the setup of the bikes over the weekend along with Craig McMartin Racing’s highly credentialled Crew Chief for the 2020 ASBK Season, Adrian Monti.
With International Challenge Races featuring “special” rules, a combination of Period 5 and Period 6, both Beau and Cam’s bikes had some slightly different specs than years gone by. With two all-important qualifying sessions, four six laps races along with 50 races for all other period classes to be held over the weekend Friday’s action got straight into qualifying.
International Challenge Qualifying
Beau and Cam hit the track for the first qualifying session on Friday morning. Beau was on the pace straight away, testament to his familiarity with the bike despite the changed engine specifications, following extremely limited seat time in the last twelve months.
Qualifying session one ended with Beau fourth fastest in the session with a 1:39.5.
Cam had originally been planning to ride Justin Mellerick’s 4-Cylinder Honda CB1100R that had been built up specifically for him for this meeting. However, some technical issues with the new engine meant that the bike was unable to be ridden past the first qualifying session. Having been a long time member of the Irving Vincent Team, and having assisted with the limited testing of the bikes in the leadup to this event, Ken and Barry insisted that the multiple Isle of Man TT winner jump on board “Old Faithful” so he had the best opportunity to ensure Team Australia could score maximum points against a well-equipped and talent laden Team USA Q2 saw a slight improvement in times for Beau with a 39.3 but several other riders went faster to relegate him to ninth overall in the session. Cam was fifteenth with a 43.9 on his first ride of the 1300cc Irving Vincent for the weekend.
Beau would start the first International Challenge face from the fourth row on combined times, Cam one row behind.
International Challenge Race 1
Saturday’s race one saw Beau starting from the fourth row launching the 1300cc Irving Vincent off the line and thundering into turn one with a packed group around him. Taking a wide line through turn two to utilise the extra corner speed he was able to carry to make up places he was lucky to avoid some oil on track that caught out several riders behind resulting in them crashing and a red flag stoppage.
On the re-start Beau got a good jump and was in the thick of the action completing the first lap in eighth place right behind former World SBK rider and AMA Superbike legend Larry Pegram on his rapid Mojo Yamaha. A 1:39.1, his fastest lap of the weekend to date, was not enough to keep Pegram in sight and Beau was busy trying to fend off Michael Gilbert on another Mojo machine. Gilbert got past on lap three as Beau dropped back into the 1:40’s in ninth position, a position he held to the chequered flag despite Team USA’s Taylor Knapp getting past on lap four when Australia’s Aaron Morris ran wide.
Cam Donald was off to a great start on bike no 86 considering the lack of Irving Vincent seat time over the weekend and was on the tail of 3-times Australian Superbike Champion Shawn Giles Katana on lap one. Cam held his position for the first three laps behind Giles whilst pulling a clear gap on Team UK’s highest point scorer Brendan Wilson, the gap over 6.5 seconds after lap three. Cam moved forward on lap four following Morris’s misfortune and crossed the line in twelfth place, ten seconds behind Beau in his first race on the Vincent for some time.
International Challenge Race 2
Saturday’s race two got away with Beau starting from fifth position on the second row and Cam from tenth.
After a hectic first lap Beau was in tenth place right behind Aaron Morris and Taylor Knapp and holding off multiple Canadian SBK Champion Jordan Szoke. Szoke got past on lap two while Beau managed to hold out Giles on the Katana for two more laps before he found a way past on lap four. Closing in quickly from behind now was Irving Vincent team mate Cam Donald, Cam had reeled off three laps only a tenth of a second apart and then uncorked his best ever lap at Phillip Island on an Irving Vincent, a 1:40.2, on the final lap to get past Beau, the thundering V-Twins came across the line .058 apart to secure tenth and eleventh in the twenty-seven bike field.
International Challenge Race 3
Race three on Sunday saw Beau line up on the grid feeling much more comfortable and confident after a day’s racing under his belt the day before. Cam was also obviously feeling more comfortable too despite the weekend starting on a very different motorcycle. Beau started from fifth position again with Cam moving forward to the third row in ninth on the grid.
It was the more like the Beau of old as he thundered toward turn one, right on the tail of former Ken Wootton Trophy winner Dave Johnson on the Carl Cox Katana at the completion of the first lap. Beau was flying on lap two, Johnson pulled out with bike problems as they approached turn one and Beau set sail, his fastest lap of the weekend, a 1:38.0 saw him close in on Michael Gilbert in fifth.
Another 1:38 on lap three was not enough to hold of Morris who was also on a charge for Team Australia, Beau relegated one position to eighth and holding off Taylor Knapp. The battle went for the remainder of the race with Beau keeping the American at bay by .072 at the flag.
Cam was having a lonely ride a few positions back, having lost touch with Giles on lap three. Holding a solid buffer over the experienced Craig Ditchburn behind Cam finished in twelfth with his fastest lap only .2 off yesterday’s benchmark.
International Challenge Race 4
Going into Sunday’s final international challenge race Team Australia held a very slender lead over Team USA, it was important that all riders for Team Australia did their bit to ensure the Team Challenge trophy was retained.
Beau Beaton would start the final race from fifth with Cam Donald in ninth again. As the field blasted off the line and into turn one for the first time there plenty of riders looking the same lines to setup a strong performance. Beau completed lap one right on the tail of Michael Gilbert in seventh with Szoke trying to use the slipstream to get past. The top speed advantage of the Team USA bikes of over twenty kph meant that Beau had to ride the Irving Vincent extremely hard in the corners to stay in front. Szoke slipped past on lap two and then Taylor Knapp on a similar machine did likewise on lap three. Beau dug deep, feeling more and more comfortable after a few days of riding he was able to maintain position right on Knapp’s tail in ninth position for a few laps while opening a safe gap over Australian Teammate Giles on the fire breathing Birrell Katana. At the chequered flag Beau was just over two and a half seconds behind Knapp and over five ahead of Giles after five consecutive laps in the 38’s and 39’s.
Not far behind Giles in race four was Cam Donald on the second Irving Vincent, Cam was, once again riding quickly and getting close to his best laps at “The Island” on the 1300cc push rod V- Twin. Cam had managed to hold off the early charge from the high experienced Craig Ditchburn before opening a safe gap. Moving up one position to eleventh on lap four, getting the better of Larry Pegram, Cam was able to maintain a fast and consistent pace to the flag with a handy gap of over thirteen seconds to Team UK’s highest point scorer Brendan Wilson on another F1 Suzuki.
After strong performances for both Beau and Cam over the four races Beau was the fourth highest point scorer for Team Australia with Cam in sixth ensuring Team Australia won the International Challenge by a slender fifteen- point margin.
Congratulations to Alex Phillis who won the Ken Wootton Memorial Trophy and Keo Watson who added his name to the list of Phil Irving Trophy winners for the first time. Beau Beaton won the Phil Irving Trophy in 2018 after dominating the Period 4 Unlimited and Period 5 Sidecar classes.
Ken Horner also made sure the Phillip Island CFA took home something from the Island Classic weekend when he made sure he won the auction of the Team UK banner signed by all the International Challenge Riders, the banner has taken pride of place in the workshop as the Irving Vincent Team now set their sights on the 2021 International Island Classic.
“First ride in a long time” said 2018 Phil Irving Trophy winner Beau Beaton. “It has been a long time off the Irving Vincent and a long-time off motorcycles in general. Overall, I am pretty happy with the weekend to be honest. I think all things considered we have taken a little step back, with my lack of seat time and everyone else has taken a big leap forward. Also, we still have a decent top speed deficit that we have to deal with even with the new engine for this weekend, The top five were flying and I just didn’t have the pace to go with them, but we were consistent across the four races and that’s what the goal was for the team. I have to say it was great to have both James from K-Tech and Adrian working with us on the weekend too. James’s product knowledge was unbelievable and Adrian, who I have worked with before, knows what I need to go fast, so the combination of them working together got me back to the pace we needed to be at faster. The bike felt better on Sunday after they made some chassis changes after Saturdays races and I think I felt better on the bike too as I was really able to pull my finger out and get close to the 37’s that we have done before. As always, a big thanks to Ken and Barry for all the work they put in behind the scenes to get these bikes to the track. So, I am happy with the weekend and that we were able to contribute to Australia winning the trophy and I am really looking forward to the next event”.
“An awesome Island Classic weekend with the team” said dual Isle of Man TT winner Cam Donald “The best weekend I have ever had with the team in fact, results may not really reflect that on paper but four strong races, improved PB’s and just generally really good fun and I felt like there is a lot more to come now. I was starting to feel better and better and having James and Adrian both proving input had a fair bit to do with that, every change they made helped the bike feel more comfortable and more like “my bike”. Beau and I have completely different setups and his results have proven how well that works for him, but I made a big step this weekend. I have known James since my TT days, so it was great to finally work with him. I spent most of the races just smiling, it was so good, plus the crowd around the bikes, they are just so passionate about these masterpieces and it really just makes the weekend for me.
Huge thank you to Ken and Barry for making sure I had a ride after the CB1100R had issues. It all resulted in a brilliant weekend for the team and I".
“We had a pretty satisfying weekend all in all” said a relieved Team Manager Ken Horner. “We had three bikes and two riders and at the end of the weekend we had three bikes and two riders with no damage and a healthy bag of points. I am glad we were able to help Cam out when the bike he was supposed to ride had some problems early in the weekend. It caught us a bit off guard and it was a bit of a rush but he has helped us out with testing in preparation for this event so we were glad we could help him. Overall, we were a little off our pace and those ahead were a little faster, it may not have looked that good but, we were not far away. It was Beau’s first ride back and it took him a day or two to get back up to speed, but on Sunday he was back to his old self and it showed in the times. With Cam he had minimal time on the bike before the first race and he got better and better as the weekend went on doing his best ever times, with more to come. We have to address the engine parity issue though, we have been talking about it for a while now but it never seems to go anywhere, especially now that the rules are a mix of Period 5 & 6 it is even more apparent that we have a massive top speed deficit. If you look at the rules in World SBK the regulations allow a 1.2 ratio between twins and fours. A similar rule for the challenge races would allow us to run a 1560cc V-Twin engine and make it much more of a fair fight. When you come away after the weekend, we finished everything and we rode as hard as we could, scored some points to help Team Australia and it has given me a case to discuss the parity issue again”.
