Ryan Dixon has been reflecting on a nightmare Dickies British Supersport Championship campaign in 2018.

Having gone into the season with hopes of a competitive season a series of retirements due to mechanical issues saw his season end prematurely.

Speaking to Kent Sports News about the 2018 season, Dixon said: “The best word would probably be a close call between ‘nightmare’ and/or ‘disaster’ as that’s basically what it was.

“A fundamental issue which we hope we have now found meant numerous DNF’s and engine issues both in British Supersport and at the North West 200! There were a couple of highs in the form of good results in there but they were overshadowed by the many bad bits unfortunately.”

During the season there were a number of points finishes for Ryan which confirmed his belief that he can challenge in one of the top racing series in the UK.

He added: “It did, it confirmed to me what I already knew, I can be a regular point scorer and should be aiming for Top 10 finishes as much as possible as I’ve had plenty of them over the past two years.”

Ryan has a good bike underneath him but he did have a number of issues and that hampered him during the season, but he hopes to have rectified that now.

“The bike is a good spec but to keep it running and competitive is expensive. I do what I can to keep it refreshed as and when possible but with such a limited budget I have to stretch my funds to try and cover everything throughout the season, entries, tyres, fuel, engine refreshes and of course the dreaded crash damage.

“I believe the bike had an issue with hitch was causing the engine problems I encountered this year but I hope that I’ve found he issue and I can get it up and running reliably for 2019.”

Due to the issues that Dixon had during 2018 he had to miss rounds and that is not something that he ever likes to do.

He said: “It’s always tough to miss rounds, I missed rounds throughout 2018 but unfortunately that’s the nature of this sport. It’s very expensive, especially to be competitive and it’s difficult to find adequate sponsorship and support to compete against the top teams with almost unlimited budgets.”

We asked Ryan what highlights he has from the 2018 season and whether any of the races stood out for him.

He added: “The biggest highlight of 2018 has to be my Feature race result at Brands Indy round 2 where I finished 8 seconds behind the winner in 9th but was just 1 second from a top 5 finish and only 2 seconds behind 4th, posting the 5th fastest lap of the race.”

With the 2019 season just around the corner Dixon revealed that he plans to be back on the grid and racing competitively.

He said: “For 2019 I plan to enter as many Supersport rounds as possible as well as the North West 200 and Ulster GP but it all depends on what sort of a budget I can get together as to how much I can do.”

Finally we asked Ryan what it is like coming from a family which is packed full of motorbike racers.

He added: “It’s great, I love bikes and have grown up around them all my life. My uncle was a double world champion sidecar driver and British Formula 1 champion on solos.

“His son, my cousin Jake has just been signed by a Moto2 world championship team after finishing runner up in the BSB championship on 2018 and my little brother is competing at British championship level too. My dad also raced solos and sidecars with various successes and competed in world championship sidecar grands prix as well as the Isle of Man TT.”

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