Gordon Ritchie | May 27, 2016
Home soil was fertile soil for both British riders in the official Kawasaki Racing Team squad at Donington park, as Tom Sykes and Jonathan Rea led the field by over 0.3 seconds, separated by only 0.039 seconds after two one-hour long practice sessions.
The Friday night 1-2 will lead the top ten riders into Superpole 2 on Saturday, with their nearest competition today proving to be Davide Giugliano (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati) on the first twin-cylinder on the combined time sheets.
Warm weather was welcome at any British round and helped another British rider Alex Lowes (Pata Yamaha Official WorldSBK Team) post fourth best time, despite the pain and lack of mobility from a recently plated and pinned left collarbone injury.
Potential injury of an unusual kind was avoided by fifth place rider Chaz Davies (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati) who had to jump off his burning machine in the afternoon session – losing 40 minutes of track time in the process.
His bike had started to smoke and after what was suspected to be leaking fuel ignited, Davies rolled to a halt in the middle of a short straight leading to Coppice Corner, and then jumped off before the marshals put the fire out after some degree of delay.
In sixth place came another British rider – the fifth inside the top six– as Leon Camier (MV Agusta Reparto Corse) once more showed his and his machine’s pace among the bigger manufacturers.
Lorenzo Savadori (IodaRacing Team Aprilia) was again in the top flight in seventh, top BMW rider was Jordi Torres (Althea BMW Racing Team) in eighth.
A minor sensation was caused when stand-in rider for the injured Sylvain Guintoli, Cameron Beaubier (Pata Yamaha Official WorldSBK Team), was ninth on Friday in what was the American rider’s first WorldSBK weekend.
The top ten was completed by the last man who had qualified into Saturday’s Superpole 2 directly, Karel Abraham (Milwaukee BMW).
Sepang race winner Nicky Hayden (Honda World Superbike Team) will now start in Superpole 1 because he just missed a chance to get into the top ten with a set-up change near the end of the session. He was 11th fastest.
Josh Brookes (Milwaukee BMW) was 16th and Sepang sensation Anthony West (Pedercini Racing Kawasaki) 18th.