MICHAEL Dunlop holds the record for the most wins at the Isle of Man TT having amassed a total of 29 victories, surpassing that of his late uncle Joey.

He is a former solo-machine lap record holder for the Snaefell Mountain Course set during the 2016 Senior TT in a time of 16 minutes 53.929 seconds at an average speed of 133.962 mph (215.591 km/h).

[3] This pugnacious attitude has led to numerous confrontations with race teams,[4] rival competitors[5] and on occasion, his late brother.

He made the decision to ride in the 2008 races at the last minute after the death of his father at the North West 200 earlier in the year.

Dunlop joined his father and uncle Joey in the record books in 2009 when he won the Supersport TT race on a 600cc Yamaha.

At the start of the 2015 Road Racing season, Dunlop had a poor start with race team Milwaukee Yamaha, and during the practice week of the 2015 Isle of Man TT, he dramatically left Yamaha to rejoin his previous team, BuildBase BMW, in order to give him the best chance of a good result.

Astride a BMW S1000RR, Dunlop bettered the existing absolute course speed record attained during one-lap, also setting a new average speed for the six lap race of 130.306 mph in a race-record time of 1 hour, 44 minutes, 14.259 seconds for the 226 miles of racing.

Following routine post-race inspection of the machines, Dunlop's bike was deemed to have infringed race regulations with non-standard parts,[13] and he was subsequently disqualified.

Dunlop returned to the start line for the second race of 6 June, the Superstock TT on a 1000 cc BMW.

For the last race of Dunlop's schedule on Friday 10 June, he led the six-lap Senior TT from lap one, extending his lead over runner-up Ian Hutchinson, winning with a 31-second margin, raising his own absolute lap record speed previously set on Saturday, 4 June by a small amount, and setting a new race record time.

This saw Dunlop concentrate on International road races whilst team mates Sylvain Guintoli and Taylor Mackenzie campaigned in the British Superbikes and Richard Cooper in National Superstock 1000.

Dunlop formed up on the grid at the TT Grandstand on board the Bennett's Suzuki in what were ideal conditions.

Setting the early pace, Dunlop crossed the line at the head of the field at the end of lap 1, posting a time of 17 minutes 15.79 seconds from a standing start, clocking an average speed of 131.135 mph (211.041 km/h).

After some pre-season testing with the Tyco BMW squad,[22] Dunlop made his way to the curtain raiser to the Irish Road Racing season, the Cookstown 100.

Wednesday afternoon’s Supersport race was another closely contested victory for Michael with Peter Hickman breaking the 130 mph average speed barrier to try and steal the win.