Rea proves he’s the man to beat
Champion leaves Jerez almost a second faster than his rivals
He may have left it late, but Jonathan Rea sent out an emphatic statement to the rest of the WSB paddock at the Jerez test this week.
With just over 10 minutes remaining, the reigning world champion, not content with his lead over the field, went out on the qualifying tyre and produced a 1:38.397 – enough to put him 0.829 clear of the man in second overall, Toprak Razgatlioglu.
To put that into perspective, Rea’s time would have put him inside the top 10 at the MotoGP test at Jerez earlier in the week and was 0.607 quicker than the race record set by Alvaro Bautista last season.
Rea’s stunning lap concluded a test where it had appeared, at least at first, that other riders had closed the gap. On Day One, Razgatlioglu was only 0.019 behind, while the second Yamaha of Michael Van Der Mark was just 0.334 off Rea’s pace.
But it now seems that Rea and Kawasaki were simply biding their time and working on little improvements to a bike that is already difficult to beat. “Normally at the end of a busy season it’s easy to get lost, but we focused on quality rather than quantity,” Rea said. “We did a lot of back-to-back testing of things we had ideas to try out during the year. Then we tested some new items and new ideas.”
One of these was a new thumboperated rear brake and the 32-year-old was pleased with the results, pointing out the benefit through turns one, two and six. Meanwhile, new teammate Alex Lowes continued to adapt to the ZX-10RR after his move from Yamaha. Lowes worked on braking and general set-up and finished fourth overall. It’s a positive start for Lowes and, despite a crash late on, he’ll be delighted to be only just over a second behind Rea at this early stage.
“From the very first laps here we made a big step, and today I felt really comfortable with the braking. This, I am really happy about,” he said. “We did some longer runs today and I could keep it in a nice consistent pace.” Ducati had also been expected to take the fight to Rea, given their form at Aragon, but in terms of lap-times never really came close. Scott Redding finished sixth with Chaz Davies ninth.
BSB champion Redding lost a lot of time on Day One after beaching the Ducati in the gravel at turn five. He said afterwards: “We can now go away for winter and cook up a master plan to come back with something a little stronger. The base isn’t bad. We’re just not getting its full potential, but I believe the bike has it.”
The first test of 2020 will give a clearer indication of what lies ahead. But for now it would appear that Rea has something extra in his locker that he can use as and when required.