SHAFTESBURY’S Spirit Moto Corsa team returned to action at the official British Superbike Silverstone test, writes James Casey.

New signing Jamie Perrin made his debut on the Spirit SP2, while Mason Law climbed back onboard as he began his British GP2 title defence.

The riders tackled the national layout of the famous British circuit, with the day consisting of four 30-minute sessions in bitterly cold conditions.

Heavy overnight rain meant that the first session of the day was quiet on a sodden track. Law completed just four laps and Perrin none.

Both riders used slick tyres as conditions improved for the second session.

Law was third fastest in GP2 with a lap time of 58.171 seconds. Meanwhile, Perrin got his first experience on his new bike and placed a respectable seventh, setting a 58.933.

Following lunch, it was straight back out on track for the third session of the day. Perrin was soon able to prove that he was making hasty progress, improving on his previous best lap by half a second to set a 58.478.

This was enough to place him sixth in the GP2 classification directly behind Law, who improved marginally on his personal best by putting in a 58.083.

After returning to the garage at the midway point of the session, a red flag with seven minutes remaining prevented the riders from going out for a second stint.

A suspension issue then delayed the start of Perrin’s final session by 15 minutes, meaning he could only complete a further eight laps.

Law, on the other hand, enjoyed a fruitful end to the day where he was able to make improvements to his bike’s setup and set his best time of the day, a 57.692.

In the combined classification for the day, Law was third fastest in GP2 while Perrin placed seventh.

The day’s pacesetter in the class was Dan Jones of iForce Lloyd & Jones PR Racing.

The Welshman showed some impressive speed, setting a best lap of 56.831, clearly making good use of the older-specification Spirit that he will be using this season.

Law said: “It was good to be back on the bike after what has been a long off season for me.

“I didn’t know how I was going to feel having not thrown my leg over a bike since the last round of 2020 at Brands Hatch. I felt a lot more ‘racy’ than I was expecting.

“Obviously re-signing with the team puts me in a nice position where I am getting back on my own bike, so there was a lot less work to be done for me. This year I’ve got a new crew, so they have a lot to learn with the bike and we worked on that throughout the day.

“We had to get the first test out of the way safely without any accidents. We didn’t go too crazy and just achieved what we had to.

“Now we are all hands on deck to improve for the next test, as we start to ramp up the testing programme to be as strong as possible at the opening round.”