Round five of this year’s Ducati Trioptions Cup was held at Oulton Park in Cheshire over the weekend and was the latest outing for Stockbridge rider Leon Morris, and a further chance for him to tighten his grip on this year’s championship.

The weekend race programme started as normal with free practice on the Friday around the 2.69 mile natural undulating fast flowing Cheshire track, writes Tim Crisp.

For once Morris found himself in fifth place and 1.2 seconds behind fastest man Dennis Hobbs, however by the time the teams went out for qualifying the sun was out and the track was dry and Morris posted the third fastest time, and only 0.2 of a second behind Hobbs.

Morris had only time to do four laps as he had an off at Lodge Corner as the bike spun around throwing him into the gravel trap, and causing a small amount of damage.

On Saturday, feeling a little battered from the crash the first of the two races saw Leon win on his Carl Cox Motorsport P&H Motorcycles Ducati ahead of teammate Hobbs.

Leon took control on lap three and was leading when the race was stopped on lap seven due to a red flag because of an oil spillages on the track. On Sunday the second race was wet and Leon finished fifth after running second until Hobbs strongly pushed his way through at the Hizzy Chicane which forced Morris off the track.

As the riders start to get towards the sharp end of the championship with only six races to go Leon has 214 points a 21 point lead over Hobbs.

The next outing for the Ducatis is at Cadwell Park over the August Bank Holiday weekend which is the least favourite of Leon's tracks before Assen in Holland in September to the ultra fast Dutch track where he has had podium finishes in the past and the final round will take place on October 5 at Silverstone, one of his favourite tracks.