Royal Enfield celebrated their very first back-to-back championship victory last weekend, once again securing the top two places of the podium in the DTRA Twins class. Pro rider Gary Birtwistle and factory development rider Paul Young went into the final round of the series with the championship already secured for Royal Enfield by Birtwistle, finishing the season with an astonishing clean sweep of 7 consecutive wins.
Championship standings decided it was all to play for in a one-on-one race for podium glory at the season finale. Racing consisted of two groups facing 3 heats each, followed by a final; with the draw separating team mates Birtwistle and Young, the Royal Enfield riders spectacularly carved their way through the strong field of contenders in their respective heats to finally meet head to head in the showdown. Birtwistle had the pick of race position on the grid, following a blistering performance in the heats, choosing the outside line in a battle royal for glory. Both riders made the hole-shot side by side then Birtwistle pulled slightly ahead on the second corner, Young continued snapping at his heels on corner exit for the first 5 laps before Birtwistle pulled a clean margin on lap six and went on to victory and a well deserved Championship celebration.
Adrian Sellers, head of Royal Enfield’s Custom & Motorsports programs said “Royal Enfield’s transatlantic racing programme has achieved back to back success with just 24 months of development, from concept to the completion of a second winning season. Our in house powertrain engineers combined with the expertise of Harris Performance’s chassis development team, all share a genuine passion and confidence in the race team and our committed riders, that has driven us to develop a championship winning machine that is truly competitive on the world stage, spearheaded by completion in the DTRA and AFT series.”
Commenting on his first Championship victory with Royal Enfield, Gary Birtwistle said – “Having finished the 2021 season with a potentially career changing injury sustained in the Pro-class I was extremely frustrated, especially following such a strong start to the 2021 season with Royal Enfield. After a tough road to recovery last winter my focus has been renewed, I was driven to give 100% to the Twins series and secure the championship double for the team; today it’s a great feeling and I’ve grown as a rider as a result. Now we’re ready to push even harder with new challenges for 2023.”
Last year’s Twins champion, team mate and Royal Enfield development rider Paul Young commented – Huge congratulations to Gary as the new 2022 DTRA Twins class champion. We’ve put a lot of work into the development of our race machines over the past two years and this weekend I’ve been debuting an all new Royal Enfield Twins FT, both machines now feature the latest research and development from our combined transatlantic racing efforts – although there are significant differences between the USA’s long track racing and Short Track in the UK – the knowledge sharing gained from all our racing efforts is continuing to benefit our twins platform, we’re looking forward to next season already.”
