Byrne suffers setback in battle for fitness

Defending MCE British Superbike champion Shane Byrne has suffered a setback in his fight to get fit for the final pre-season test in just two days time at Donington. The five-time champion broke his hand in a testing crash at Almeria last month.

Making good progress in his recovery, partly thanks to copious time spent in a hyperbaric chamber, he’s now been forced onto a course of antibiotics after an infection in the site of the surgery he had to repair the break to his fifth metacarpal.

“It feels like a lot of my past few weeks has been spent in the hyperbaric chamber! You always have that moment where you come to rest in the gravel when you know you have injured something and the first thing on your mind is ‘when can I be back’. I knew I wasn’t going to be back out in Spain, but then the target had to be the official test although that was only a few weeks away.

“Me and the team worked really hard over the winter and now I am working even harder to be race fit. I got a bit of an infection in my hand this morning so I need to get that sorted with some antibiotics, but the season won’t wait for me so I just need to get on with it. I can’t wait to get started and I will have done everything possible to be ready for the first races of the season.”