Practice report
World Superbike Donington Park
Donington WSBK: Rea dominates Friday practice for Kawasaki
Jonathan Rea put in a dominant performance in Friday practice for the Donington round of the World Superbike Championship, leading the field by more than half a second on his factory Kawasaki.
Rachit Thukral
Edited: Jul 16, 2022, 3:23 AM
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The six-time WSBK champion took a little over five minutes in second practice to lower Toprak Razgatlioglu’s benchmark of 1m27.805s from FP1, putting himself well clear of the opposition with a 1m27.359s.
The 35-year-old managed to shave another four thousandths on his next flying lap, which should have been enough to end the day’s running comfortably on top.
But Rea found even more time on his final run, posting a time of 1m27.016s to put daylight between himself and his rivals, as the chequered flew after 45 minutes of running in the afternoon.
Last year’s title winner Razgatlioglu ended up as Rea’s closest challenger on the works Yamaha with a time of 1m27.568s, while Scott Redding made most of an upgraded BMW package that included a new swingarm to finish just 0.031s adrift of the Turkish rider in third.
Kawasaki’s apparent pace advantage in Friday practice was validated by Alex Lowes, who jumped from seventh to fourth on the timesheets with a late effort of 1m27.678s.
That pushed championship leader Alvaro Bautista down to fifth place on the lead Ducati, more than seven tenths behind his chief title rival Rea but only 0.046s down on Lowes.
Bautista’s teammate Michael Ruben Rinaldi was classified another 0.005s behind in sixth, while Loris Baz - who is carrying the same updates as Redding on the satellite Bonovo MGM BMW bike - was a strong seventh.
Andrea Locatelli finished eighth on the second of the works Yamaha bikes, a tenth clear of the next best R1 of Garrett Gerloff (GRT team).
The top 10 was rounded off by Leon Haslam, who is making the first of his planned wildcard appearances with Pedercini after replacing Loris Cresson aboard the team’s full-season entry at Assen.
Returning from a fracture on his right hand, Lucas Mahias finished the day a solid 11th onboard the Puccetti Kawasaki with a best time of 1m28.482s.
Reigning British Superbike champion Tarran Mackenzie delivered an improvement of more than a second between the two practice sessions on Friday in his maiden WSBK outing, eventually finishing 15th in the order on his McAMS Yamaha.
He narrowly beat Isle of Man TT winner Peter Hickman (FHO BMW), who is making his first WSBK outing in the series this year since the same Donington Park round in 2019.
Donington WorldSBK - FP2 results:
Cla # Rider Bike Time Gap 1 65 Jonathan Rea
Kawasaki 1'27.016 2 1 Toprak Razgatlioglu
Yamaha 1'27.567 0.551 3 45 Scott Redding
BMW 1'27.598 0.582 4 22 Alex Lowes
Kawasaki 1'27.684 0.668 5 19 Alvaro Bautista
Ducati 1'27.730 0.714 6 21 Michael Ruben Rinaldi
Ducati 1'27.735 0.719 7 76 Loris Baz
BMW 1'28.090 1.074 8 55 Andrea Locatelli
Yamaha 1'28.305 1.289 9 31 Garrett Gerloff
Yamaha 1'28.431 1.415 10 91 Leon Haslam
Kawasaki 1'28.470 1.454 View full results
Donington WorldSBK - FP1 results:
Cla # Rider Bike Time Gap 1 1 Toprak Razgatlioglu
Yamaha 1'27.805 2 65 Jonathan Rea
Kawasaki 1'27.939 0.134 3 21 Michael Ruben Rinaldi
Ducati 1'28.046 0.241 4 22 Alex Lowes
Kawasaki 1'28.087 0.282 5 19 Alvaro Bautista
Ducati 1'28.161 0.356 6 45 Scott Redding
BMW 1'28.456 0.651 7 47 Axel Bassani
Ducati 1'28.665 0.860 8 7 Iker Lecuona
Honda 1'28.807 1.002 9 76 Loris Baz
BMW 1'28.857 1.052 10 5 Philipp Oettli
Ducati 1'28.913 1.108 View full results
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