Cam Donald returned to action last week at Cookstown.

After a 10-month hiatus through injury, Relentless by TAS Suzuki rider Cameron Donald made a successful return to road racing’s ‘Between the Hedges’ discipline earlier today at the Cookstown 100 in Ireland last week, dispelling any doubt that the double-TT Winner would return to competitive racing.

With a brace of second places on his Relentless Suzuki GSX-R1000 in the Superbike races, and a steady fourth-placed finish in the Supersport race on his GSX-R600, the Melbourne rider was more than happy with his first appearance back on the national scene in three years.

“I’m very happy. Of course I never race to finish second, but we did say today was all about feeling our way back in and progressing with the Superbike,” Donald explained. “We have achieved both of those goals so I’m going home a happy man. The difference between national road racing and the international stuff is like chalk and cheese – it really shocked me in that first race.

“I have never been ultra-successful here at Cookstown with its stop-start nature, preferring the fast and flowing circuits, but I did take Ryan Farquhar all the way in that last Superbike race. He’s the man on form and I won’t take that away from him, but I sat back and watched for a few laps and did think I had the measure of him. Unfortunately I made a small mistake coming onto the last lap and those 50 yards made the difference between winning and finishing second.

“In the 600cc race I got caught up in a bit of ‘riff-raff’ which made me laugh a bit as there were some whacky moves being pulled on me. It was a good spin-out and fourth place at the end wasn’t so bad. It’s been a good day.”