Image: Octopi Media.

Monster Energy Kawasaki’s Jason Anderson claimed a solid third place at Houston after recently reverting to the shock he used last season in a bid to aid his charge towards the front.

Anderson displayed speed throughout the opening races of the season, but unforced errors kept the New Mexico native out of podium contention in the first two rounds.

“We started off the season with a different shock,” said Anderson. “I believe there’s a lot of benefits to that shock, but for me personally, I think my riding and racing is a little better on what my set-up was. I think for me, some of those benefits on the other shock, I really want to figure out, but I think that’s for another day.

“I think for the rest of the season, we need to make little improvements here and there with where we’re at. So yeah, just try and be better and close that gap up a little bit, I think I kind of lost myself in the first couple of rounds but we’re making gains, there’s a lot of racing left and we just need to keep striving.”

Anderson notched his first main event podium of the year at Anaheim 2’s Triple Crown, notably winning the second final on his way to P2 overall. He was 12 seconds from race-winner Eli Tomac (Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing) on Saturday at NRG Stadium and now sits fourth in the championship as the series heads to Tampa this weekend.