The entry to Keppel Gate is around a sweeping right hander followed by the sharp left itself. A few years ago the fence posts at the right hander before Keppel were moved back 20 or 30 yards. The posts were made of concrete and were very unyielding! They used to be very close to the apex of the bend and were a serious hazard for a rider who was on a tight line well cranked over. The fence posts have been replaced by the same type of flexible, reflective marker posts as used at Brandywell (so if you do clip them with your shoulder or knee they’ll simply bend out of the way!). There are lots of damp patches in the middle of the road through Keppel Gate and down to Kate’s Cottage no matter how long it’s been dry and sunny – this is where underground streams ‘bleed’ through the road surface. As long as you don’t hit them with the brakes on and the bike ‘nose loaded’ you can more or less ignore them.

Keppel has a really grippy surface (- probably Shellgrip) and generates huge lean angles. You can probably get somewhere around 50deg of lean angle mid-corner - it's great fun! As you pick the bike up and accelerate down the hill in 4th gear, you gather pace quickly as the incline is quite steep. The road is also narrow and the left hander by Kate's Cottage is sharp. Keep close to the wall on the right to give yourself the maximum amount of space through Kate's as the road stays narrow and you want to carry as much speed as possible down the straight that follows.

The run down from Kate’s to the Creg is great fun because there’s a downward step in the road about 1/3 of the way between the two. The bike pulls a big wheelie as you cross this crest and you can use 6th gear to keep things under control. As soon as the road levels out, you need to get on the brakes and start coming back through the gears to 3rd for the sharp right hander at the Creg-ny-Baa. There’s not a lot to be gained from rushing the corner so concentrate on getting a smooth entry line. As with the corner at Brandywell, the authorities have flattened the grass bank on the inside of the turn at the ‘Creg’ so the view here is a little bit clearer than it used to be. Brake early and try to be smooth – concentrate on getting a good drive out of the corner and using all the road on the exit.

As you exit Creg-ny-Baa and start the drop down to Brandish, this is a chance to check your gearing as you should be able to pull peak revs in top gear. Speeds on a modern 600 will be up around 170mph so it's important to be geared correctly otherwise you're wasting valuable time on the fast sections if you've undergeared. If you’re unable to pull peak power revs in top, you’re overgeared and if you’re having to roll it off to avoid hitting the limiter you’re undergeared. (The only other places on the circuit where you get this opportunity to check your gearing is on the drop down past the Highlander and Sulby Straight). You should be hitting 6th gear just before the right hand kink.

Everything changed at Brandish Corner in 2007. Construction of an entirely new bend took place over the winter of 2006/7 between the MGP and the TT. The new Brandish Corner is an extremely fast (- 4th or even 5th gear) cambered, sweeping lefthander. The brake marker for Brandish is the pebble drainage area on the right hand side of the road but the turn-in point is a bit difficult to discern. However, as the bend is wide, long and smooth you’ve got some margin for indecision. There’s a bump close to the edge of the road on the right, which may be the join between the original tarmac and the new surface and it’s enough to unsettle the bike on the brakes so look out for it. The grass banks are no longer close to the road as they’ve been pushed a long way back on the left to allow road traffic visibility all the way through the bend and on the right the grass banking follows the line of the old road. This all gives the new corner a wide, open aspect and encourages a very fast transit through. As with the re-engineered Windy Corner, it’s probably knocked at least 2 or 3 seconds off the lap time.

Due to the much quicker transit through Brandish, the approach to Hillberry is now a lot faster than it used to be. As you drop down the hill, the road looks rather narrow. There's a low wall on the left and you need to be directly alongside it. Dab the brakes and come back one gear for the turn-in and drive into the apex on the right. Lean angles are pretty large but there isn't much space to play with on the exit and definitely no room to run wide.

On a 600, it’s swings and roundabouts whether you go through Hillberry in 5th gear or 6th gear. A quick rider could probably hold onto 6th but I generally come back to 5th to get the drive up the hill towards Cronk-ny-Mona on the exit. On a 750 it’s definitely a 5th gear corner. On a 400, you can hold it in 6th without too much problem although you then need to roll off then roll back on to keep it driving – it’s as well to come back to 5th. You also need the bike to be accelerating so that you can use the throttle to tighten the line if you feel you're running a little wide on the exit.

Cronk-ny-Mona used to be a complex section with 2 different road junctions. The road layout has been substantially altered, widened and simplified and there is now only one junction – Johnny Watterson’s Lane- where there used to be two. Cronk-ny-Mona is about 4 bends that you take in one smooth sweep. To get the right line, you need to look for the old tarmac, which is the line of the old road before it was widened, and take that as your reference. Run through the cross hatching in the middle of the road and aim to exit the junction section of Cronk-ny-Mona where the cross hatching narrows to a point and terminates. The road undulates significantly and the left hand side of the road is where you need to be. Don't let the bike drift over to the right of the white line on the exit of the bend as the combination of the undulations and a touch of adverse camber can unload the back tyre and have you in serious trouble. Keep the bike to the left of the white line as that's where the camber will work to your advantage.

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