Mar-Train Yamaha has announced the signing of Danny Kent for the 2024 British Superbike Championship season.
Kent, the 2015 Moto3 World Champion, will join the Mar-Train team after the end of the 2023 season. This year he showed competitive form until his final race at Thruxton, at which point budget constraints at his own Lovell Kent Racing team have prevented his continued presence on the BSB grid.
Until that Thruxton race, Kent had shown speed that had often made him the best-placed Honda rider, despite his team’s privateering reality, and he was able to take two podium finishes.
Danny Kent said: “I’m very happy to be joining Mar-Train Racing and Yamaha for the 2024 Bennetts BSB season. I’d like to thank Tim and everyone at Mar-Train for giving me this opportunity and believing in me.
“Mar-Train put together a very competitive package with Yamaha and I feel we have everything in order to have a successful 2024. The goal, as always, is to be a consistent podium challenge and secure our first BSB win together.”
Kent will arrive at Mar-Train as they become the second Yamaha team in BSB. In 2024, OMG Racing will step up to be the official Yamaha UK team, and that role will see it also give support to Mar-Train. Kent will also be working with Chris Anderson, who previously worked with 2021 BSB Champion Tarran Mackenzie at McAMS Yamaha.
Tim Martin, Mar-Train Yamaha team owner, added: “We’ve been really impressed with Danny’s performances in BSB so far, especially this year, so when it became clear he was available for 2024 I was keen to get him signed up. You don’t become the first British rider to win a Grand Prix World Championship in 40 years by chance, so he clearly knows how to ride, and that Grand Prix style should really suit the high corner speed, flowing style required to ride the Yamaha R1.
“We’re looking to make the ‘next step’ as a team in 2024, and signing Danny is one part of our plan, but the other was the hiring of Chris Anderson from McAMS Yamaha. Chris has played a huge role in McAMS’ success over the last seven years, so we are delighted to have secured his expertise as we look to become regular championship front runners in 2024.”
Mar-Train’s announcement of their Kent signing comes after confirmation that it will be splitting with Jack Kennedy at the end of the season, the #4 with whom Mar-Train won the British Supersport Championship last year in time to step up to the Superbike class for the final two races before their first full season in 2023.
That first full season showed promise at times for both Mar-Train and Kennedy but, while there have been flashes, those flashes have not been occurring consistently enough for Kennedy. The #4 currently finds himself 11th in the championship, one place and one point ahead of Kent, who has missed the last two rounds for the aforementioned budget constraints.
Exactly where Kennedy will end up in 2024 is still unclear, but he will contest his penultimate round for Mar-Train this weekend (29 September - 1 October) at Donington Park.
