Rea Fastest Overall At Catalunya Tests

Jonathan Rea completed an intense two-day test at the KRT team’s home circuit of Montmeló, near Barcelona, setting the best lap of all during this morning’s slightly cooler session. 

Both Rea and team-mate Alex Lowes worked on machine and tyre set-up to suit the hot conditions they expect to experience at the next few races, they were also fast over one lap. Rea set a best-of-test 1’40.450 single lap time and Lowes was fourth overall with his 1’41.137. 

In all, 17 WorldSBK riders were at the Montmeló circuit for this test, giving Jonathan a good reference of the main competitors’ performance levels after a long halt to the 2020 season.

This test provided Jonathan and the team a final on-track preparation before the season restarts at Jerez in a few weeks. It was also ideal preparation for the Catalunya race weekend itself, which is scheduled for the weekend of 18th to 20th September.

The WorldSBK season will restart for real - after what will be almost a five month break due to the global Covid-19 pandemic - at Jerez de la Frontera with race days on the first and second of August.

Jonathan Rea, stated: “This morning I used a race tyre, the soft tyre and then two qualifying tyres. That was the target this morning – to work on ultimate pace and see what we could do. After that we started to work with the set-up again and tried to confirm some items on the front to give me some more stability. We backed-to-backed both bikes to find if we confirmed the set-up of what we arrived with at the Misano test. I preferred that to my old base set-up so it seems like we have moved our base set-up away from what I had. I don’t know if that is because the temperature suits that kind of bike set-up or if my riding style has evolved during this lockdown period and it has changed. But what I am requesting from the bike now I have a good feeling with this one. In the afternoon I waited for the temperature to be at the maximum to do two longer runs on both bikes to understand some test items. We felt pretty happy and now we look forward to Jerez.”