Glenn and Andrew Irwin fired up for British Superbike opener at Silverstone

Irwin has made the switch to the PBM Ducati team to ride the Panigale V4R after parting company from Honda Racing UK.

The 33-year-old – who won all three races at the Northamptonshire circuit a year ago – was 0.255s down on pacesetter Jason O’Halloran (McAMS Yamaha), who led the way by only 0.040s from former champion Leon Haslam (ROKiT BMW).

"I feel good in myself and that is the main thing,” he said.

"Both physically and mentally we are in a good place to mount a championship challenge. Silverstone is always exciting and can throw up some strange things, so it will be interesting to see what happens this weekend, especially in the dry.

"I am excited to see where we measure up,” Irwin added.

"I am feeling positive to see where we are in the dry and what we now need to work on because we know the strengths of my bike, but we can only see it when we are in competition, and we can only do that at a race weekend now.”

Andrew Irwin, who has replaced his brother Glenn in the official Honda line-up, slipped to ninth after the second free practice session after crashing out unhurt.

Irwin was third fastest in FP1 but was denied the chance to improve on his time on the Fireblade following the incident, although he still earned his place among the top 12 riders who have progressed straight into Q2 today.

“For sure I have some nerves coming into the first round,” said Irwin.

“It’s my first race coming back with Honda so you have those nerves but I think that’s a good thing, something that if it wasn’t there would be more of a problem, so I just have to use them.

“I’m excited to get back into it and to get back into a race situation where we’re going to try to come away with three strong results,” he added.

“I think we can do a good job, the bike’s good, the team’s good and I am in a good place at the minute.”

The BSB Sprint race on Saturday afternoon is at 4.30pm with Sunday’s races at 1.30pm and 4.30pm.

In the National Superstock 1000 class, Alastair Seeley – back in the series with Northern Ireland’s SYNETIQ BMW team – was 13th overall after the first two practice sessions.

The ex-champion was nine tenths down on pacesetter Billy McConnell (Jackson Racing Honda), while Eglinton’s David Allingham was fifth on the Milenco by Padgett’s Honda.

Michael Dunlop was three places behind Seeley in 16th on the Hawk Racing Honda as he prepares for the upcoming North West 200 and Isle of Man TT.

In the Supersport class, Lee Johnston was third fastest on the Ashcourt Yamaha while Cameron Dawson (MSS Kawasaki) led the National Junior Superstock times.