Reigning World Superbike champion Jonathan Rea set the fastest lap time on the first day of the currently ongoing pre-season test. Aboard the new 2021 Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10RR, the six-time champion set a blistering lap time of 1min 40.793sec in the last 30 minutes of the day’s eight-hour session.
Rea managed to lap almost a whole second faster than the 2020 Tissot Superpole fastest time on the Barcelona track, albeit with a revised turn 10.
Honda’s Leon Haslam came in second on the day’s leaderboard with a time of 1min 40.900sec, which put the British racer ten thousandths of a second ahead of Yamaha’s Garrett Gerloff, who came in third with a lap time of 1min 40.910sec.
Scott Redding, who happens to be last year’s runner-up, came in fourth with a time of 1min 40.962sec on the Ducati Panigale V4 R, while the fifth spot on the leaderboard went to BMW’s Tom Sykes who posted a time of 1min 41.265sec.
With the top five spots filled by all five World Superbike manufacturers, this year’s pre-season testing is looking interesting indeed. With the first official race of the season in May, this year’s riders have a month’s worth of time to dial things in and get their bikes sorted.
Check out the full day one test session results below.
