PBM UK rider James Ellison hopes to put into practice the experiences of the opening round in Qatar when he contests round two of the MotoGP World Championship in Jerez this weekend.

The 31-year-old from Kendal returned to the Grand Prix arena for the first time since 2006 at the opening round where he brought the Claiming Rules Team (CRT) specification PBM UK Aprilia ART home in 18th place on the team's debut in the premier class.

The Penrith-based team have since had more valuable time to continue their steep development curve with the bike but with a race under both theirs and Ellison's belts, they are going into the first of the Spanish rounds with renewed optimism.


James Ellison:

"I made the trip to Jerez a little early so I could get out on my bicycle in the Spanish hills around Madrid and also catch up with my wife's Spanish side of the family, it's been really good to see them and also great to get out on my bike without being soaked to the bone! It was a tough weekend mentally in Qatar as I didn't gel with the bike as much as I was hoping until the race and I made two big mistakes which cost us 10 seconds in total. Without those mistakes the result would have been far more promising so I have taken the positives out of it and will work really hard again at Jerez to try to carry on with the improvements we made in Qatar."

Phil Borley, Crew Chief:

"We made a lot of progress in Qatar and although the result didn't reflect that, we did well to get a finish on the same lap as the leader and it's given us a lot more information to work with. This is a long term project and we have to find our feet so all we need again this weekend is another solid performance from James and we will get more competitive as the season progresses."

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