Eighth spot for Josh at Silverstone

Editorial Department • Published 5 Aug 2010 16:30 0 Comments

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Josh Elliott in action at Silverstone where he claimed eighth place.

Ballinamallard's Josh Elliott claimed eighth spot when he competed in his home round of the World Superbike Superstock 600 championship at Silverstone last weekend.

After the confidence boosting pole position last time out at Brno in the Czech Republic, and despite his crash late in the race there, he hoped for a strong performance at Silverstone but he had a number of problems before racing to eighth place.

"That was a hard day! In the end I am happy to finish eighth after the rear tyre problems in the race. We made changes which definitely helped the front end but I was getting too many slides to safely keep the pace of the group in front. It is disappointing for me after I went so well in Brno and I would have liked to give the great support I had here more to cheer about. The next race is at the Nurburgring in Germany not that far from where my team are based, so I hope I can get back on the pace there. I am very thankful for the support of my team and sponsors. I have to say a special thanks to Simon from the Margal group who stepped in to help for the Silverstone round," commented Elliott.

Josh's hopes were dented when he tried, but was unsuccessful, in getting a test at the new Silverstone circuit layout in order to learn it and get some set up.

Some of his foreign competitors did get to test but this was not to be his biggest problem over the weekend. He did however manage to get a few sessions at the Ron Haslam race school aboard one of their bikes which uses part of the track.

First free practice highlighted the difficult task of finding a competitive set up on his Racedays Kawasaki and proved to be the deciding factor in how his race was to pan out.

Despite attempts in both qualifying sessions to get the gearing and suspension right on the Silverstone bumps, Elliott was not able to ride the machine at the level he wanted and had to settle for ninth in qualifying.

A final gamble on suspension was taken to try and get his machine more to his liking for the Saturday evening race and the Fermanagh teenager made a good start. He held onto a bunch of riders in eighth place with good pace but suffered badly from lack of rear grip in a few laps. After some near moments he was forced to slow his pace and dropped back from the group and was relieved to cross the line in eighth at the end.

Team manager Gerry Bryce felt it was a respectable result for the Fermanagh flyer.

"A tough weekend for Josh and the team, particularly after the pace he showed at Brno, but eighth is still a respectable result at this level and he showed great maturity in managing his tyre problems and bringing the bike to the finish. Nurburgring is next for us, the scene of Josh's two podiums in German Supersport last year and I'm confident Josh will be running at the front again."

There is a five week break until the next round, on September 4, but the team are making efforts to get Josh out for a test in Europe in the interim.

This article appeared in Impartial Reporter 05 Aug 10

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