BSB: Jason O'Halloran to remain with McAMS Yamaha for fifth consecutive season

Jason O’Halloran has signed a new deal with McAMS Yamaha and will stay with the team for a fifth consecutive Bennetts British Superbike Championship season.

The Aussie has won 21 races onboard the Yamaha R1 over the last four seasons, more than any other rider-team combination, with 18 of those coming in the last two years. O’Halloran has also recorded a total of 41 podiums with the team.

“Deciding to continue with McAMS Yamaha for 2023 was a pretty easy choice for me,” O’Halloran said. “Over the last three years we’ve won 21 races together, it’s a team I feel absolutely at home with, and we know we can be in a position to fight for the title as we have for the last three years.

“2022 didn’t quite end how we wanted, but that’s not to say that we didn’t have a positive year – seven wins, a load more podiums and we learned even more about the R1 so that can put us in an even stronger position for 2023.

“The team won’t rest on their laurels, there are new parts coming from World Superbike and we’ll continue to push on as we look to achieve our ultimate goal of becoming champion.”

Despite being so successful, O’Halloran has missed out on the title through unfortunate circumstances in the Showdown.

Last year, O’Halloran’s ‘Main Season’ championship lead was cut from 106 points to 30 as per the Showdown regulations. Two crashes in the opening Showdown round at Oulton Park left O’Halloran with a 10-point deficit to teammate Tarran Mackenzie, with the latter going on to win the title.

Meanwhile, this season O’Halloran was Bradley Ray’s closest challenger heading into the Showdown, sitting 13 points behind the eventual champion. However, O’Halloran’s title hopes were ended once again at Oulton Park when he was taken out Druids on the final lap of the opening race by Peter Hickman. He was then taken out on the first lap of Race Two at the same corner by Tommy Bridewell.

“Jason has been brilliant for the team over the last four years so keeping him on board for 2023 was our number one priority,” Team Boss Steve Rodgers said. “While we were all devastated about how the 2022 season ended, after a few weeks to reflect it’s hard to say that it was a bad year – seven victories and 20 podiums is more than anyone else other than Brad.

“We know what Jason is capable of, we know he deserves to win the British Championship and we’ll do our best to give him everything he needs to do that in 2023. We’ve got some new parts coming from the guys in Italy which sound really promising, so we can’t wait to get started!” 

McAMS Yamaha will continue to work with Yamaha’s race department in Italy to develop the R1, with several upgrades expected head of pre-season testing.