MICHAEL Rutter said he was delighted for his team after a super weekend at the North West 200.

The Kingswinford racer scored a win, podium finishes and a fastest lap at the legendary Northern Ireland event on his Bathams Kawasaki machinery.

Rutter took his 13th win at the event, setting a new Superstock lap record in the process, as a week of hard work from his MSS team really came to fruition during Saturday’s highlight races.

He said: “The bike was effectively new so we were learning as we went along, the guys worked some massive hours with everyone in the garage early and working right into the night.

“It was a real team effort and I am well chuffed for them.”

The race meeting didn’t start so well as the team had to battle with set-up issues at this unique fast, road circuit with riders hitting more than 205mph and stop-go chicanes.

Unfortunately, the Superstock Kawasaki ZX-10R was only running on full steam by the time of the wet practice session, meaning Rutter qualified in the second wave of riders.

Despite this, the experienced rider battled through to seventh in the first race on Thursday.

The second Superstock event was held during the packed Saturday schedule and with new settings Rutter rode a perfect race, coming through to take the overall win and logging a fastest ever Superstock lap, with an average speed of 120.153mph.

In the Superbike class, he battled with the leading group in both feature races and was rewarded with a fantastic fourth and second place, giving him one of the best scorecards of the event.

To make things sweeter he also finished third in the Supertwins race on his little Kawasaki ER6-F machine.

Rutter added: “I can’t believe how well that all turned out. We had some small set-up issues and were left to put the best laps in whilst the track was wet, hence the rubbish grid position.

“So to come through for the win in the Superstock race was fantastic.”