Gordon Ritchie | November 22, 2016
The world champion showed who’s boss in the damp conditions at Jerez.
The second day of the second main tranche of private tests for some of the top WorldSBK championship teams in 2017 finished with Jonathan Rea (KRT) making the best of his 2017 machine development, with a fast lap time of 1’40.8 late in a day of drying conditions. On a still not quite completely dry track, with some patches of dampness left from heavy first day and overnight rain, Rea rode with confidence and aggression as he made comparative tests and performance evaluations.
Others were still working through their latest machine set-ups, or were still getting to know their new bikes.
Rea will now test for the remaining days, having lost Monday completely to a wet track surface. He said of his one day on track so far, “We tried some new electronics strategies for engine braking,” he stated, before explaining that, “there are some positive and some negatives so we are just fine tuning that. We are running full 2017 spec already, we are within what we can do in 2017 and just playing around. I already ran a generator all year. Kawasaki has some different components for power. This track is not the best test for horsepower or top speed because we do not use a lot of RPM and we are only in top gear for a short period on both straights.”
Not all the top riders were on show – three days of testing remain for some – but Tom Sykes (KRT) was second fastest, and now-factory supported Milwaukee Aprilia rider Lorenzo Savadori was third.
With his team-mate Nicky Hayden missing after hurting his knee in a dirt track training accident, new WorldSBK runner for Honda Stefan Bradl was fourth quickest, as he now waits to sit out the winter and take command of his all-new Fireblade in 2017.
Jordi Torres ran a Fortis rear swingarm to compare to his existing Suter version, and took his BMW Althea Racing S1000RR to fifth best time on Tuesday.
Eugene Laverty (Milwaukee Aprilia) continued his testing duties and has one more day to go, as he went sixth fastest. Already happy to be in what is obviously a factory-supported team with six Aprilia staff in addition to the SMR British-crew, Laverty has now had experience of fully wet and almost dry track conditions. He will run again on Wednesday.
On the final three days Pata Yamaha, Aruba.it Ducati, MV Agusta Superbike and KRT will take to the track again, alongside several MotoGP teams. Aprilia has one day left to run. Honda, Grillini Kawasaki, Althea BMW and MV Agusta’s WSS team finished for the day.
PJ Jacobsen rode the official MV Agusta for one day today, as did recent ESS Supersport rider, Alessandro Zaccone.
Tuesday Times Jerez
1 Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team) 1:40.8
2 Tom Sykes (Kawasaki Racing Team) 1:41.8
3 Lorenzo Savadori (Milwaukee Aprilia) 1:42.3
4 Stefan Bradl (Honda WorldSBK) 1:42.5
5 Jordi Torres (Althea BMW) 1:42.8
6 Eugene Laverty (Milwaukee Aprilia) 1:43.1
7 Markus Reiterberger (Althea BMW) 1:43.5
8 Jeremy Guarnoni (Pedercini Racing Kawasaki Stock 1000) 1:44.1
9 Marco Faccani (Althea BMW Superstock) 1:44.5
10 PJ Jacoben (MV Agusta Reparto Corse WSS) 1:45.1
11 Alessandro Zaccone (MV Agusta Reparto Corse WSS) 1:45.2
12 Ayrton Badovini (Grillini Kawasaki) 1:55.0 – Damp Morning
13 Ondrej Jezek (Grillini Kawasaki) 1:56.0 – Damp Morning.
