Althea Honda's Tommy Hill secured a brace of point-scoring finishing Phillip Island's opening round of the World Superbike Championship and says he is happy to be in the saddle.

The youngster, who is coming back from a year-and-a-half-of injury, got a great start to his 2009 campaign, finishing with a pair of 14th places from a 20th-position grid slot.

“We had a really good start to race one, even  though I could not do a practice start in the damp conditions this morning. I hadn’t done even  one practice start before, so I was happy to have got away as well as I did," said Hil.

"This is my first real race back for a year and half. I got straight into the row in front and changed my line in the first few corners. So I went from 20th to 9th! Halfway through, grip dropped off, mainly in the rear, so I had to adapt my style.”