Lauder’s Steve Kershaw at top of British Formula 2 sidecar championship leaderboard after two wins in Leicestershire

The Borderer is targeting his first British title win as unfinished business 16 years on from last competing in the Federation Sportive de Randonnee Automobile and Auto Cycle Union championship and he’ll be accompanied by a new sidekick, Merseysider Rhys Gibbons.

The 37-year-old is riding a newer version of the Louis Christen Racing chassis he went with back in 2009, coupled with Honda 600 engines for the first time.

Round one of eight making up 2025’s series took place at the Croft circuit near Dalton-on-Tees in North Yorkshire last month, that being the first time Kershaw had raced there in a decade.

That Saturday’s first race saw Kershaw and Gibbons finish second to former champions Lee Crawford and Scott Hardie and just ahead of last year’s most improved team, Kieran Clarke and Andrew Johnson.

The day after’s second race ended with Newcastle’s Crawford/Hardie in front, North Yorkshire’s Clarke/Johnson second and Kershaw/Gibbons third, leaving the Lauder-based pair joint-second in the series’ standings.

Mallory Park in Leicestershire hosted round two on Sunday, cramming practice, qualifying and two races into a single day.

Despite not having raced there since 2017, Kershaw ended up only two-tenths of a second off pole position in qualifying, going on to help claim his team’s first overall F2 win ever after 13 laps, with Clarke/Johnson second and East Yorkshire’s Bob Dawson and Matt Sims third, previous series leaders Crawford/Hardie having been sidelined by a blown engine halfway through.

Race two saw Crawford/Hardie fail to make the start-line, allowing Kershaw/Gibbons to help themselves to a flag-to-flag victory one lap short due to a red-flag incident on the final ride round.

Clarke/Johnson being forced to retire due to a fried clutch, Dawson/Sims finished as runners-up, with East Suffolk’s Sean Hegarty and Jack Knapton third.

With a quarter of the series behind them, Kershaw/Gibbons top the championship leaderboard with 86 points, 24 ahead of Dawson/Sims on 62, with Clarke/Johnson third on 56.

Kershaw is delighted to have taken an early lead and is hoping to hang onto it for the six rounds to come, saying: “We raced the bike as we bought it at the end of last year, but all the work we have done over the winter has made a massive difference.

“We’re the only team in the top five today on a standard engine so we are down on top speed, but the bike handles and stops beautifully, so it’s been enough to take our first-ever British F2 wins.”

Those two wins came exactly 20 years after Kershaw claimed his first sidecar victory at Mallory Park on his parents’ vintage Triumph outfit aged 17.

To follow them up, he and Gibbons will be taking part in round one of 2025’s Scottish sidecar championship this weekend at Knockhill in Fife as preparation for June’s Isle of Man Tourist Trophy races.

The half-dozen British F2 championsip rounds to go are at Snetterton in Norfolk in May, Anglesey in Wales in June, Brands Hatch in Kent in July, Cadwell Park in Lincolnshire and back at Croft in August and back at Mallory Park in September.