‘Back to the drawing board’ for Tag as Ellison endures difficult weekend

James Ellison battled hard to finish outside the top ten in both races, as yet another weekend went by where the Anvil Hire Tag Racing Yamaha rider suffered tyre issues and technical trouble.

Ellison, in his final year of BSB racing, sits 12th in the championship, 25 points away from the final showdown position – currently occupied by Jake Dixon. However, he is not the only Yamaha out of the top six, with Josh Brookes in 7th and Tarran Mackenzie in 16th out of the point scorers.

“It’s the hardest I’ve ever had to work for an 11th and 12th. It was a bogey trap for us, we just couldn’t get the bike working at all. It didn’t do what I wanted it to do, and it’s not a million miles off, it’s just a little tiny bit each corner.

“I’ve always openly said I’ve never been happy with the rear of the bike, all through testing and then we made progress at Donington and then again we made a step forward at Brands and I was starting to like it, it was starting to feel like my bike. But they’re very smooth circuits and we’ve come here with a few bumps, undulations and ripples in the circuit and it’s just not doing anything I want it to do.

“We’ve tried almost everything this weekend, we just need to go back to the drawing board at the workshop and get our heads together and see why it’s not loading the rear when I want it to. Like I’ve said I’ve never had to work that hard before for 11th and 12th. The bike is just so close to being awesome, but it’s just far away enough to where I can’t ride it to where we need to be, and I’m not an 11th and 12th place guy.

“I go back to America to see my family this week, but I’m obviously in close contact with the team while I’m away. We’ll come up with a plan following my feedback and come up with a plan to go to Snetterton and try and get back to where we should be.”

The next round comes from Snetterton, a track at which Ellison had rotten luck at last season, when he broke down out of a podium position in race one, also retiring in race two on the McAms Yamaha.