ADAC Northern Europe Cup heading for home straight at Silverstone

• Different procedure under banner of British Superbike championship
• Standard class: Dirk Geiger intends to extend his lead
• GP class brings Tim Georgi to England

Munich/Silverstone. The ADAC Northern Europe Cup riders will line up for the penultimate meeting of the season next weekend (8th - 10th September). Under the banner of the MCE British Superbike Championship, the ADAC NEC riders will contest two races at Silverstone alongside the British Moto3 riders before heading off to the TT circuit at Assen for the grand finale three weeks later.

Standard and GP class riders will line up separately for both events. The first practice session in the GP class will get under way on Friday at 11:10 am local time. Standard class practice will be at 11:45 am, lasting 25 minutes. GP class is next up with second practice at 2:55 pm, followed by the Standard class at 16:25 pm. Qualifying in both classes will be on Saturday at 10:20 (GP) and 10:55 (Standard) and last 25 minutes.

The first GP race will be on Saturday at 3:15 pm over ten laps. The Standard category is next up at 5:20 pm with a ten-lap race over the 5.901-km circuit. Both classes will have a seven-minute warm-up session on Sunday at 10:07 before the second race begins at 10:45 am for Standard and at 14:55 for GP riders. Both races will again cover ten laps.

Geiger the man to beat in Standard Class

After seven of eleven races, reigning champion Dirk Geiger (15, GER) on 145 points leads the overall standings in the Standard class. The ADAC Foundation Sport protégé told us: “I made some mistakes in Brno, was not on the limit and was too relaxed in my approach.” After fourth place in the Czech Republic, Geiger now intends to catch up again and promised: “That won’t happen to me again. I will mount an all-out attack in every session at Silverstone and push in the race right from the start.”

Geiger likes the British grand prix circuit: “This is a nice track, and riding there for the first time last year went quite well at the time, so I feel quite confident. But Philipp Freitag (20, GER) can also still remember the British circuit and is keen to see a repeat of his double victory in Donington Park. He is currently second in the championship standings on 107 points.

Toni Erhard (16, GER) is third in the overall rankings. The Kiefer Racing rider is only two points down on Freitag and 15 points up on team-mate Leon Orgis (16, GER). Oliver König (15, CZE) is next with 88 points. The Czech rider won last time out at his home circuit and can hardly wait for the next round: “Silverstone is one of my favourite tracks, because things went very well for me there last year. I’m looking forward to it and can hardly wait to return to England. I’ll do my utmost to catch up with Dirk in the overall standings, even though he’s already pulled out a big lead.”

GP class: Jähnig right behind Georgi

In the run-up to Silverstone, ADAC Sports Foundation protégé Tim Georgi (17, GER) on 125 points is ahead in the GP class. He had to miss two races due to prior commitments and now intends to pick up the points he dropped: “I know the track from last year and aim to win at Silverstone. The circuit is very nice, basically, but quite tough to ride. Nevertheless, I’m dying for the weekend to come round.”

While Georgi was busy racing in the Moto3 World Championship, Jan-Ole Jähnig (16, GER) took advantage of his absence, drawing ever closer to his Freudenberg Racing team-mate. With 112 points, Jähnig plans to stay with Georgi again this weekend and rack up as many points as possible. But the 16-year-old will not have it easy, because he does not yet know the circuit, unlike many of his fellow competitors. “But I’ve been getting prepared, spending long hours practising with computer games and videos,” he told us.

At the same time, Jähnig will have to watch out, because Walid Khan Soppe (17, NED) is only 16 points behind him in the overall rankings, and Kevin Orgis (17, GER) is clearly also within striking distance with his 93 points. Ernst Dubbink (28, NED) is next in fifth place with 69 points. However, there are 100 points still up for grabs with four races to go.