RIDER BLOG: TYCO BMW’S CHRISTIAN IDDON READY FOR RACING AT BRANDS HATCH & A ‘BIT OF NORMALITY’

I’ve been a bit non-existent of late since my crash early doors at Knockhill in the middle of June, so I wanted to update everyone how things have been progressing. The last lot of weeks have been about recuperation really. The injury I’ve had is strange really for me as I’m just not used to it. I had two operations: one to clean the wound out and the second to have a skin graft and all went well.

But then with it being a skin injury, it takes time to heal and we ended up missing Snetterton, which in hindsight I believe now was probably the correct decision, as I don’t think looking back it would have been wise to ride there. It’s frustrating for me even though it’s now progressing, as it’s not the sort of injury you can do much with. I asked about so many different things to try and help the recovery, but each time I was told that, ‘I just need to leave it’ and wait.

I was in a plaster cast up until the Thursday [June 29] before Snetterton to keep it as still as possible, and although I went there with every intention of riding, it just wasn’t to be. With regards to the championship in British Superbike, we are ten races in and I’ve missed four and we’ve dropped to eighth in the championship, but it’s not unassailable. We can still fight for that top six and that’s the plan when we get back on track at Brands in just over a week’s time.

With what has happened, all you can do is look forward and focus on the future and getting better. One positive is that I was able to travel out to Suzuka to represent BMW Japan at the test for the famous 8-hour race. It’s an absolute honour to be asked as it’s something I’ve always wanted to do. I’d never been to Japan before and with my dad having raced it years ago, I was pretty excited to be going out there.

As a matter of fact, I’ve never even competed in an endurance race before, so again that was going to be something new for me. I travelled out after Snetterton to the test with my regular BSB crew chief Leigh Finlay and it was quite an experience.

As a test it was quite a difficult one, as we were using a different suspension and tyre set-up than I’m used to in BSB, and the electronics we used, were not quite ready for us to jump on and go fast. I only got about 20 laps and I did struggle a bit, as it’s not a simple circuit, especially as I was also trying to get used to a different chassis and tyre combination.

The BMW Motorrad 39 Team has another test this week with Raffaele De Rosa and Daisaku Sakai who will be my team-mates at the event. Hopefully when I go out for the race at the end of the month [July 28-30] after Brands BSB it will be a different bike, which I’m sure it will be, thanks to the support of BMW’s technicians.

I know the experience is going to be pretty cool and something I’m really looking forward to. From what I saw of Japan during my few days at the test, it’s a really nice place and the people are absolutely wonderful, so I’m really excited about it to be honest.

Before that we have Brands Hatch BSB coming up which is the sixth round of the championship and I my arm is healing well and giving me no discomfort now, so I can’t wait to get back to racing. I’ve not been able to go motocrossing since the injury and my training regime has been completely flipped on its head, so it’s been a case of sitting on the turbo trainer up to now. I couldn’t go too hard as I didn’t want to sweat the graft too much, but on a positive note, I did get to spend some time with the family and I also watched some racing at Oliver’s Mount, Scarborough.

Hopefully now we can get back to some form of normality and of course that means racing at the sharp end at Brands, and getting some healthy points back on the board with the main goal to jump back into that all-important top six Showdown spot.