[5] The Showdown format was introduced in 2010 in order to prevent a rider from making a runaway victory in the championship.

Other past champions include Neil Hodgson, Australian Troy Bayliss and Steve Hislop.

Kiyonari fought off the challenge of Ducati powered Leon Haslam and Gregorio Lavilla at the final round in Brands Hatch in front of a capacity crowd and a reported 1.5 million live TV viewers, with Kiyonari and Haslam each winning one race, and Lavilla crashing and having an engine problem in both races.

The 2009 British Superbike Championship was mainly dominated by the Yamaha of Leon Camier who set a new record of 14 race wins in a season at event eight of twelve, such was his domination of the championship, beating the previous record of 13 by Niall Mackenzie in the 1997 season.

[7] Guintoli, Brookes and Richards all missed races, allowing Stuart Easton of Hydrex Honda and Simon Andrews of MSS Colchester Kawasaki to challenge.

MSVR stated that "It will be open to anyone in the series from the official manufacturer-backed teams through to independent entries and will allow homologated machines with full Superbike racing rolling chassis to retain the very important visual impression but engines will have to be built to very stringent "Stock" regulations.

[12] For the 2012 season, MSVR announced a number of changes to the technical regulations to enhance the spectacle of the British Superbike Championship.

In the past, however, manufacturers took advantage of loopholes in the rules to create "homologation specials" — motorcycles with low production numbers made especially for racing.

[17] During the 2006 season ITV1's BSB coverage attracted an average UK adult audience of 962,000 per round with a peak audience of more than 1.5 million for the cliff-hanger final leg at Brands Hatch[18] Races were covered live by ITV and Sky Sports.

[19] This was a step down from where the BSB had previously been having an effect on the viewing figuresThe total UK BSB TV audience in 2008 was 7 million compared to 11 million in 2007 – which averages at 600,000 per round which was basically split 50:50 between Eurosport and Channel 4[20]Privateer Cup Champion: Dave Heal (Kawasaki ZX-7R) (Myco Motorsports)