Evotech Performance & McAMS Yamaha, BSB 2019

British SuperBike is long-time revered as one of the most exciting race series in Europe – with the appearance of Aussies and other nationalities on BSB grids over the years, it’s a fair bet to say further afield too. As well as a battleground for the various bike manufacturers, BSB is also an arena for young stars from the support racing classes to aim for, show what they are capable of and then migrate to international status with WSB or MotoGP, or both. BSB is also a stage for former WSB and MotoGP gladiators to do battle. Over the years this has led to joyful tears and, for many tier one riders, fears of being butt-kicked. Also, BSB is very hard, as you’d expect, on the 1000cc superbikes and the ever supportive team staff.

July 2019: McAMS Yamaha

July is often seen as the halfway point of the British Superbike season. Round six (Snetterton 300, 19th-21st July) of 12 rounds underlines this. With six racing weekends done and dusted, we here at Evotech Performance thought it would be good for our fans far and wide to get an inkling on how involved we can be with our supported teams.

We have close ties with all our supported teams, but McAMS are a little different because of the racing age of its BSB weapon the Yamaha R1. Did you know, there hasn’t been a new or radically revised R1 since the present model appeared? BMW Motorrad, Suzuki, etc all have newer models.

Yamaha celebrated 20 years of R1 in 2018, and it was hoped a new R1 would have appeared from the team at Yamaha Corporation based in Shizuoka Prefecture Japan. But no. Not yet. Maybe this July at the Laguna Seca round of WSB. We are looking forward to getting hold of this hoped for new model, not just because we want to extend our Yamaha range of EP accessories, but also we do like a good road missile to view and ride…

Because of its age, a lot of development and production of unique chassis components for the present McAMS R1 has been undertaken by Evotech Performance – as can be read from the below interview with Chris Anderson, crew chief/technician/fulfilment supervisor for Tarran Mackenzie, McAMS Yamaha.

A race crew chief’s view – Chris Anderson, McAMS Yamaha

EP: So how is the 2019 season so far for McAMS?

CA: “Jason (O'Halloran) is getting it together and Tarran (Mackenzie) is consistently taking it to the competition even though we are at a disadvantage. As you know, the Ducatis are a purpose built race bike and we are racing with a road bike converted to be a race bike. Tarran is working wonders with the bike because it suits his riding style; he is extremely fast through the corners; he carries good corner speed and is on the throttle when a lot of riders are still on the brakes.”

EP: Can you say what EP components have been fabricated specifically for McAMS?

CA: “Where do we start? OK, EP guards for the race-spec water and oil coolers, exhaust hanger, battery and ECU boxes, brake guard and throttle cable sliders for the quick detach cables. There are other parts, too.”

EP: The EP brake lever guard/protector is fairly new; would you say having such a product reflects the need for such a thing?

CA: “Oh yes… not just for rider safety but also in the same way you need cooler guards to prevent any serious downtime. The front brake lever protectors are mega; we haven’t yet had a lever snap-off with EP protectors in place. The front brake master cylinders are £2,500. We’ve had five crashes so far and not had to replace a lever let alone a master cylinder. What a saving! If I bought a road bike, a brake lever protector would be the first thing I’d buy. In fact, we sent three damaged – that’s damaged not broken – protectors back to Evotech Performance today for product evaluation purposes.”

EP: So it’d be fair to say McAMS has a good working relationship with Evotech Performance?

CA: “There needs to be a good relationship with all suppliers. But it helps that the EP boys are into their bikes, racing and quality – Dan was on the phone yesterday for a catch up and a craic. Plus they have all the equipment and facilities to act on a team’s needs as quick as they can. They’ve a new bolt manufacturing machine, which was handy because we needed some specialist link bolts for the race bikes’ suspension. It didn’t take long to get what we needed.”

EP: Your thoughts overall?

CA: “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: when EP did our swingarm crossover from the standard swingarm to a Suter version, there was no one else in the country that could do what they did in the time-frame they had – I’ve been in this game a long time and I honestly can’t think of anyone. First off they weighed it all up, built a rapid prototype print version and then went from there. Unbelievable really."

While Evotech Performance supported race teams are provided with unique, one-off component parts, this is just one part of the relationship. All components are regularly checked and evaluated for their performance under race conditions – especially for road-based circuits such as the IoM TT. Not only does this ensure supply quality, it also gives Evotech Performance invaluable feedback that can assist with making our road-going EP accessory lines for road-going bikes the very best you, our customers, can buy.

By Evotech Performance on 12 July 2019