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An edited press release from Team Virgin Mobile Aiwa Yamaha:
The Team Virgin Mobile Aiwa Yamaha R1 achieved a very satisfactory result at Silverstone, made all the more impressive by the fact that the completely fresh machine was only uncrated from the factory six weeks ago.In race one Steve Plater gained a fine podium spot and Simon Crafar\'s top nine finish marked the Kiwi\'s return to the big bike class. Simon was untroubled in his point-scoring battle and looked to have the machine settled and turning into corners faster than has happened so far throughout the pre-season testing in the lead up to the first race.
The second race was a strong team effort with Steve Plater scoring a fine sixth and Simon coming home eighth.
Both Steve and Simon were making fantastic progress after suffering poor starts with Plater closing down the leaders but with the race being concluded over a shorter distance time ran out for Steve to make even more gains.
A pair of top ten finishes in the second race was superb reward for the hard work and effort put in by the riders and the whole team who have begun the development of the new machine.
Crafar said: \'I wouldn\'t say I am happy with my results here because I like to get out there and win but getting out on the bike in a race environment was a real eye-opener. It is there that the true potential of the machine can be seen and that is so clearly obvious now. We put in some good lap times today. I had a bit of a problem with the clutch in the first race which slowed me up a bit but I saw that we are heading in the right direction with the bike. We have plenty of ideas to work on. The whole set-up is very good and very encouraging for me to get the fullest out of the bike and myself.\'
Team boss Rob McElnea added: \'That has been a superb start to our campaign. To have had our bike for such a short space of time, achieved what we have in that timescale and come away with not only a podium but some amazing lap times is the stuff dreams are made of`. \'We have never said we would do this or that. We just wanted to prove what we could do out on the track and I think that here today we shot a warning across the bows of the other teams. The new Yamaha R1 is an awesome machine and we have started to unlock that potential.
We have carried on from where we left off last year as the total crowd favourites and both Simon and Steve will grow that support even further.\'
Result race one: Winner: S Emmett, 2 S Hislop, 3 Steve Plater Team Virgin Mobile Aiwa powered by Yamaha, 4 J Reynolds, 5 S Byrne, 6 K Harris, 7 M Rutter, 8 P Brown, 9 Simon Crafar Team Virgin Mobile Aiwa powered by Yamaha, 10 G Richards
Result race two: Winner: Hislop, 2 Reynolds, 3 Emmett, 4 Rutter, 5 Brown, 6 Steve Plater Team Virgin Mobile Aiwa powered by Yamaha, 7 Richards, 8 Simon Crafar Team Virgin Mobile Aiwa powered by Yamaha, 9 Thomas, 10 Ellison
Championship points after one round: Hislop 50, Emmett 41, Reynolds 33, Steve Plater 26, Rutter 22, Brown 19 Simon Crafar 15.
