Carl Phillips crowned Ulster Superbike champion for second time after penultimate round abandoned - 'I think I've surprised people'
Carl Phillips has a second Ulster Superbike title in the bag after Saturday’s penultimate round of the championship at Bishopscourt was abandoned due to heavy rain.
The Lisburn man went into the weekend with a lead of 58 points over 2024 champion Jonny Campbell, but with only two races and a maximum of 50 points available at the end-of-season Sunflower Trophy meeting back at Bishopscourt in October, Phillips cannot be caught.
He previously won the title for the first time in 2019 and has come out on top once more after returning to racing this year for the first time since the Sunflower meeting in 2022.
Phillips has won six USBK races this season to put the outcome beyond doubt on the SBT Ireland Kawasaki, while Campbell (155 Racing BMW) in second place holds a 17-point advantage over McAdoo Racing Kawasaki’s Korie McGreevy ahead of the final round.
Phillips, who was a double Superbike race winner at the Celtic Match Races at East Fortune last weekend, said: “It’s not how I wanted to win it, but we had a comfortable margin going into the weekend and we knew what we needed to do.
“It was just a matter of playing the game, but obviously I didn’t want to win it this way, but it’s what set out to do this year, to win the title, and especially for Alun [Gorman] of SBT Ireland, who was sponsoring the championship and I’m riding his bike.
“I got the opportunity through Alun to come back this year and to be honest, I think I’ve surprised people with how quick I was.
“I’ve went faster at every track and I’m riding better than I ever have, so we set out to win it and I knew we could always do it, and I knew we weren’t going to be slow.”
Phillips qualified fourth fastest at Bishopscourt in the Superbike class, with McGreevy on pole from Campbell and Mike Browne (BPE by Russell Racing Honda).
He added: “It was looking like it was going to be wet from the beginning and we had a wee issue in qualifying, but we just needed to be on the front row and get away at the front.
“I knew with it being wet we’d be in with a good shout as well, and we’ve made improvements with the bike since being away at East Fortune, and we were sharp coming into the weekend. I wasn’t really thinking about the championship, I was up for it.
“All year we’ve been quick in the wet and dry, and last weekend [at the Celtic Match Races] we had a wet race and won that, and won in the dry too, so wet or dry we were confident we’d be battling.
“We did the qualifying today and it wasn’t too bad. We woke up this morning about seven o’clock and the motorhome was swaying in the wind.
“It was actually looking quite good but then the rain came in, and it just didn’t stop.”
Phillips was taken on an inspection lap of the course and said the conditions at Bishopscourt were the worst he had seen.
“The assistant clerk of the course asked me to go and do a lap around the circuit in the car and I’d never seen it like that, especially Turn 1 and Turn 2, which normally dries really quick here, it was actually flooded,” said Phillips.
“I feel sorry for the club but I’ve seen it as bad at Bishopscourt and there was running water up the back of the circuit too, so it would have been madness to even think about running it.
“The standing water was absolutely awful. It’s just a pity because I was excited for the weekend, but it didn’t really go ahead.”