Ballinamallard racer Josh Elliott was back in action at the Silverstone round of the British Superstock 1000 championship last weekend and he finished an excellent seventh but felt that had it not been for a clutch problem and poor start, a podium would have been within reach.

He explained: “I was feeling confident with the bike and my own capabilities. Things didn’t go quite to plan as I got a poor start and got boxed in on turn one. I dropped back to 12th and got stuck behind riders that couldn’t run my corner speed so they were holding me up mid turn and affecting my exit speed. I clashed 2-3 times with one rider and he was riding very wild to keep me behind him when I had the faster pace. This was very frustrating because I could see riders in front starting to pull away. Whenever I made a pass I could close the gap right away so it’s a pity I didn’t get away as I am convinced I had the pace for a podium today.

Although I was a little disappointed after the race, on reflection I’m delighted for the whole team and rewarding them for their efforts with my best finish of the season. There’s more to come for sure. I would like to say a massive thanks to all my sponsors for sticking with us and the much appreciated support.” The famous Northamptonshire circuit is one of his favourites and he had proved his speed there at a recent one off support event at the British Moto GP round. Elliott quickly got into his stride with the eighth fastest time in first qualifying and had an impressive final qualifying with a string of consistently fast laps to secure fifth place on the starting grid, only 0.28 seconds off pole.

With his best qualifying of the season in the bag he was confident going into the race but only one issue was troubling him. The team had to rebuild his clutch prior to the weekend and the feel wasn’t good on his practice starts.

When the lights went out, sure enough the snatchy feeling hampered a smooth launch and he dropped to around 12th after turn one. He got his head down and got embroiled in fierce battles to make up ground, struggling to make up places with riders in front difficult to pass by braking very late even though they were running slower corner speed.

The Fermanagh teenager had to adjust his style to cope and started to make progress. He managed to make passes on two of this season’s race winners as he closed on sixth in the final laps, but try as he might, he crossed the line in seventhth just losing out on a top six by 0.09 seconds on the line.