The McAMS Yamaha team are gearing up to make their debut on the world stage this weekend as reigning British Champion Tarran Mackenzie joins the Superbike World Championship grid for a wildcard entry at Donington Park.

The Leicestershire circuit is a venue Tarran and the team are very familiar with given it appears twice each season on the Bennetts British Superbike calendar and it’s also the venue of one of Mackenzie’s most impressive BSB wins so far when he stormed to a commanding victory on the Grand Prix layout last October.

However, there will still be a lot to learn for both the team and Tarran as they bolt a World Superbike-specification engine and Magneti Marelli electronics onto his McAMS Yamaha R1. The chassis the team use in BSB is identical to that run by the factory PATA Yamaha WorldSBK team, so with the engine and electronics, Mackenzie will be on equal machinery to his Yamaha rivals.

The challenge will be eased with the support on offer from Yamaha Racing, but neither Tarran nor the team are underestimating the scale of the job on hand as they take to the track on the WorldSBK-spec machine for the first time without any testing prior to the event.

With the forecast for the weekend looking positive, Tarran will get three practice sessions on his R1 before Superpole and the opening race on Saturday, before the Superpole race and final race outing on Sunday.

Tarran Mackenzie
“I’m looking forward to this weekend a lot! The weather forecast is looking great so we should get a lot of decent track time so I can’t wait to get stuck in. It’s going to be a lot to take in, as our engine and electronics will be WorldSBK specification so we’ll have some work on to get used to that. We just need to take it session by session and see what comes as the weekend goes on.”

Steve Rodgers
Team Principal
“We are really excited to make our WorldSBK debut at Donington this weekend with Tarran. It’s going to be a busy week as the team meet with Yamaha to build the bike to WorldSBK spec, including taking on a WSB-spec engine and Magneti Marelli electronics. Fortunately, Tim Seed our electronics guy is hugely experienced and has worked with Marelli in WSB before, while Jason’s crew chief Les Pearson will also be joining us at Donington given his very recent experience working with the Yamaha World Superbike teams, plus we have support from Yamaha too. We have no expectations for Tarran, we’ll just take each session as it goes and enjoy the weekend in the sun!”