Aragon WSBK: Rea beats Bautista, Razgatlioglu in practice

Having topped the Dorna-supported test at the Spanish track earlier this week, Rea was also quickest across the two practice sessions on Friday on the revised Kawasaki ZX-10RR as he began his quest for a seventh WSBK title.

The Ulsterman was quick out of the blocks in FP1, going straight to the top with a 1m49.301s. Alex Lowes briefly made it a 1-2 for Kawasaki at the head of the timesheets, before Razgatlioglu and then Ducati’s Michael Ruben Rinaldi pushed him down to fourth at the end of the session.

Rea’s time, however, wasn’t to be beaten even after the second practice session in the afternoon, with his nearest challenger Bautista - returning to Ducati after two seasons at Honda - ending up more than three tenths adrift with his time of 1m49.606s set in FP2.

Razgatlioglu failed to improve on his previous lap in the afternoon, which dropped the reigning champion in third on the factory Yamaha and just 0.041s ahead of the GRT-run R1 of Garrett Gerloff.

Rinaldi finished a strong fourth with a time of 1m50.000s, beating the second of Kawasaki of Alex Lowes by just one hundredth of a second.

As was the case in the Aragon test, Loris Baz again emerged as BMW’s top contender on the satellite Bonovo MGM-run bike, finishing seventh-fastest with a time of 1m50.336s.

Andrea Locatelli had a low-key session on the second works Yamaha, ending up nearly eight tenths adrift of his teammate Razgatlioglu in eighth.

Roberto Tamburini made an impressive start to his rookie WSBK season by posting the ninth-quickest time aboard the Motoxracing Yamaha, while Honda made it five manufacturers inside the top 10 courtesy of a 1m50.540s effort by MotoGP convert Iker Lecuona.

Philipp Oettl was classified 11th overall for the one-bike GoEleven team, while Ilya Mikhalchik finished 12th and comfortably outpaced his factory BMW teammate Scott Redding on his WSBK debut as Michael van der Mark’s replacement.

Aragon WSBK - FP1 results:

Cla	Rider	Bike	Time	Gap
1	Jonathan Rea	Kawasaki	1'49.301
2	Toprak Razgatlioglu	Yamaha	1'49.665	0.364
3	Michael Ruben Rinaldi	Ducati	1'50.000	0.699
4	Alex Lowes	Kawasaki	1'50.064	0.763
5	Alvaro Bautista	Ducati	1'50.108	0.807
6	Garrett Gerloff	Yamaha	1'50.269	0.968
7	Loris Baz	BMW	1'50.336	1.035
8	Andrea Locatelli	Yamaha	1'50.442	1.141
9	Iker Lecuona	Honda	1'50.540	1.239
10	Philipp Oettl	Ducati	1'50.641	1.340
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Aragon WSBK - FP2 results:

Cla	Rider	Bike	Time	Gap
1	Alvaro Bautista	Ducati	1'49.606
2	Jonathan Rea	Kawasaki	1'49.630	0.024
3	Toprak Razgatlioglu	Yamaha	1'49.706	0.100
4	Garrett Gerloff	Yamaha	1'49.900	0.294
5	Alex Lowes	Kawasaki	1'50.010	0.404
6	Michael Ruben Rinaldi	Ducati	1'50.154	0.548
7	Roberto Tamburini	Yamaha	1'50.501	0.895
8	Andrea Locatelli	Yamaha	1'50.571	0.965
9	Illia Mykhalchyk	BMW	1'50.706	1.100
10	Loris Baz	BMW	1'50.785	1.179
View full results