Automotive industry charity, Ben, is inviting the automotive community to take on Benathlon in September and host a Ben’s Big Breakfast in October to raise vital funds and support those who are struggling or in crisis.

To take part in the second Benathlon, participants will exercise in their own way for 30 minutes each day for the 30 days of September and raise £30 for Ben. Participants can choose how they complete the challenge, for example, by walking, cycling, running, swimming, or even by horse riding or skipping!

Benathlon runs twice a year and aims to improve participants’ mental and physical health while also fundraising to support automotive colleagues to get back on track. A total of 130 people took part in March and September's event is already shaping up to be bigger and better than the last with many people already having signed up.

Ben’s Big Breakfast is in its third year, running from 9th-15th October, and invites automotive industry companies to host a breakfast to fundraise for Ben.

Breakfast brings together employees, customers and families to share the most important meal of the day, aiming to connect with each other and check in, supporting each other’s mental health. A total of 158 companies took part in last year’s Ben’s Big Breakfast and the charity hopes for this year to be even bigger and better.

Sign up today!
Click here to take on Benathlon
Click here and get eggcited for Ben’s Big Breakfast

Matt Wigginton, Director of Partnerships, Engagement & Income at Ben, said: “We can’t wait to get cracking with our next fundraising events later this year and hope to see many of our automotive family take part in both!

“Demand for Ben’s support services has reached new highs due to the cost-of-living crisis, so without your support we can’t continue to support the increasing demand. Thank you - more people than ever need our support, yours will mean we can reach them all.”

Whenever any member of our automotive family is struggling, or in crisis, we all rally to support.

It wasn’t the best of Sundays for Aprilia on the Sachsenring. After the difficulties encountered yesterday, Aleix and Maverick were unable to straighten out the German race weekend today.

Aleix and his team gambled on the soft rear tyre, partially in light of the data collected during the Sprint. It was, unfortunately, a gamble that did not pay off. Although he battled in the early stages of the race, the Spaniard had to reckon with a drastic drop in grip towards the end, finishing outside the points zone.

Maverick, on the other hand, had a technical problem that forced him to a DNF during the ninth lap.
     
Aleix
"I think that with the medium tyre, I would have been able to finish easily in the top 10. However, the data from the Sprint race yesterday seemed to indicate wear that was not too excessive for the soft and that’s why we decided to use it. The decision did not pay off. In the finale I basically had no grip. We were lacking in performance this weekend, as the results from the other Aprilias also shows, on a track where we did not expect to encounter these difficulties."

Maverick
"The weekend had started off well straight away but then we were unable to express our potential. If we work well, we know that we can be fast, but evidently there were some problems which conditioned our performance. We still don’t know if this stems from a problem with the engine that forced me to retire. We’ll analyse the data in-depth now and try to figure it out. It’s a shame but complaining won’t help anything. We still believe in the project and we’ll keep our heads down and continue to work hard. The positive note is that I recovered positions in both starts – yesterday in the Sprint race and today in the GP – so from this point of view there was improvement."

Award-winning leading Midlands conference and events venue, The British Motor Museum has extended its South Wing following continued expansion in line with client demand. Within only six months after an initial £70k investment, the conference centre has been developed further to offer South Wing 5. This spacious room seating up to 110 delegates boasts natural daylight and direct vehicular access making it an ideal space for conferences, product launches and exhibitions. South wing 5 is complemented by South Wing 1-4 which are excellent breakout spaces to create a self-contained event experience.

Direct vehicular access offers exceptional ease of loading right up to the event space itself minimising the time and effort in arranging the logistics and delivery of large-scale display product and associated equipment. The South Wing offers five conference spaces totalling 477sqm of flexible conference and exhibition space. Each room in the South Wing is fully air-conditioned and equipped with the latest data projectors and benefit from the Museum’s free 1Gbps Wi-Fi.

The South Wing offers a range of flexible spaces comprising South Wing 1, 3 and 4 each offering space for up to 50 delegates. South Wing 4 offers additional scalable event space and can be divided into 2 smaller rooms, via a partition wall, each with its own entrance. South Wing 2 offers a smaller more intimate space taking up to 16 delegates theatre style.

Toby Batchelor, Head of Commerce at the British Motor Museum commented, “We are delighted to announce South Wing 5 which further demonstrates our commitment and investment and even greater choice for our clients. This large modern event space further extends the South Wing and offers several scalable break-out options for delegates. We pride ourselves in supporting a unique delegate experience and to this end we provide all British Motor Museum conference delegates with free access to the adjoining British Motor Museum collection which is easily accessed directly from the South Wing”.

For more information about the event and meeting spaces available please visit britishmotormuseum.co.uk/conferences/spaces

A positive top-nine was achieved by Team Gresini Racing MotoGP which places both riders in the points with Alex Marquez and Fabio Di Giannantonio sixth and ninth, respectively, at the chequered flag.
 
This was a sort of confirmation for both the Spaniard and the Italian, who had a positive and solid showing throughout the weekend and were able to finally capitalise on a good result also in light of the upcoming last of three back-to-back events at Assen. 
 
Diggia, in particular, put together a great comeback after being all the way down to 14^th at some stage. He recovered five positions before sealing his fourth top-ten finish of the season after Argentina, Texas and Le Mans.

7^th - ALEX MARQUEZ (11^th in the championship standings – 52 points)
“We surely bagged some more important points. Too bad for losing so much time behind Aleix (Espargaró) who started the race with soft tyres and in the first laps he tried – rightfully so – to defend his position. When I got past him it was unfortunately too late to bridge the gap with the leaders, even though my pace was top-five worthy. We’re happy and if we managed to solve some set-up issue earlier, we would be talking about a different type of result.”
 
9^th - FABIO DI GIANNANTONIO (15^th in the championship standings – 34 points)
“We had a great race, maybe my best so far. We completed several overtaking manoeuvres on a track where it’s almost impossible to pass. I’m really happy, even though it’s a shame that we started so far back because the pace was really good. We’re charged up for Assen.”

Two crashes ruined an otherwise good Friday in Germany for Team Gresini MotoGP, who will have some extra work to do today to fix the Desmosedici machines #49 and #73 ahead of tomorrow. It was a pity especially for Fabio Di Giannantonio, who missed the chance of battling for the direct seed to Q2 after showing that it was well within reach. Alex Marquez managed to get through anyway, and with a 9^th place he will surely have a more relaxed FP3.  
 
The Italian rider managed to stay with the leaders for the whole opening day. His crash at turn 11 happened at the worst time of all – with three minutes left in the session, as the youngster from Rome could not defend his position from his rivals’ charge in what was the best moment, conditions-wise, after the morning rain.
 
Marquez crashed slightly further into the lap (turn 13) during what could have been his fastest lap of the day (he was +0.008secs away from today’s best lap-time in the third split).

9^th - ALEX MARQUEZ #73 (1’20.671s)
“It was a positive day: I managed to be quick straight away and FP1 was a good session. Without the rain we managed to continue the work done with the bike and everything went well. Too bad for the crash during the last time attack because it was a really good lap, but that’s what Fridays are also for: to find the limit. We’re in Q2, so mission accomplished for now.”
 
11^th - FABIO DI GIANNANTONIO (1’20.799s)
“I’m disappointed, even though I must say we’ve been constantly quick today, so it was also an encouraging day. We did everything perfectly timing-wise and with the tyre choice. I entered the track and got a yellow flag and then a red one. Once we made our way back to the track the tyre had lost a lot of temperature and thus I crashed. Here tyre-temperature is key, especially at turn 11 which is the first right-hander after many to the left. We were not lucky today, but we’re charged up for tomorrow.”