Essais Qatar

[theophil]

Ellison: I was happy... until I saw Carlos' time.

New Tech 3 Yamaha James Ellison made considerable progress during the three-day Qatar test, which concluded yesterday, but the 25-year-old knows he still has plenty more to learn after being left two seconds from experienced team-mate Carlos Checa.

"I clocked a 2mins 0.00secs at the end of the first day which was two seconds faster than I had done on the WCM last year. I was happy with that... until I saw Carlos' time in the 1min 58secs, I knew then that I had a long way to go," James wrote in his latest Crash.net column.

"I changed my style a lot for the second day - and the times became more easy to achieve - but I was against a brick wall and finding it difficult to break the 2min 0.00secs barrier, getting into the 1min 59secs only a couple of times."

However, set-up and riding style changes for the third and final day meant Ellison was able to break into the 1min 58secs, but was still left two-seconds from former factory Yamaha rider Checa - who lapped within less than half a second of reigning world champion Valentino Rossi.