Kendal's James Ellison finished today's Catalan MotoGP race tantalisingly close to a second points finish in a row but missed out by a little over two seconds as a gearbox problem hampered his efforts to catch and pass Randy De Puniet.

The former British Superbike front runner was only five seconds behind eventual CRT top dog Aleix Espargaro as he was missing gears along the Barcelona track's tow big straights which negated the time he was making up through corners.

"I was happy with my pace but disappointed not to get into the points and stay with the leading trio of CRT bikes at the end. It didn't help that I was missing gears down the straights so that is something we are going to look into," said Ellison.

"On a good lap I could close right in but then the problem would reoccur and I lost the time I'd made up. I'd like to say a big thanks to the team as they worked their butts off to get the bike ready after warm up where I crashed and we are now looking