Jonathan Rea "excited to start the season now" after pulling wraps off new Pata Prometeon Yamaha

The six-time champion is joined in Yamaha Motor Europe’s official line-up by 2020 Supersport champion Andrea Locatelli.

Ulsterman Rea made the shock move from Kawasaki after nine years in his quest to challenge Ducati and Alvaro Bautista as he seeks a seventh title.

The 36-year-old finished third in last year’s standings, claiming one victory at Most in the Czech Republic as Rea struggled to take the fight to Bautista and former champion Toprak Razgatlioglu, whose decision to leave Yamaha and join the factory BMW squad this year opened the door for Rea to take on a new challenge on the YZF-R1 alongside Locatelli.

“I am just excited to start the season now,” said Rea.

"The transition into the Yamaha family has been a really smooth one and throughout winter testing we’ve been working hard on getting comfortable on my R1, exploring the limits and understanding the work we need to do to start the season.

"It’s getting very close to Phillip Island, a track I really enjoy and the target is to try to enjoy the bike every weekend – to exploit all its strengths – and for sure the goal is to be competitive and fight for race wins.

"I am curious to see our full potential in Australia, but just now after the Pata Prometeon Yamaha team photoshoot in my new colours, everything is real.

"I really feel like a Yamaha rider now and I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do together.”

Rea has impressed during winter testing on the Yamaha and was second fastest overall last week at Jerez in Spain, half-a-second down on WSBK rookie and reigning Supersport champion Nicolo Bulega, who has teamed up with Bautista in the Aruba.it Ducati team.

Testing continues on Monday and Tuesday at Portimao in Portugal as the countdown continues to the first round of the championship at Phillip Island in Australia from February 23-25.

Following the Jerez test, Rea said: “Every day is a learning day and doing those long runs really helped me understand the bike.

“You only have so much electronic controls on the bike and during a race simulation, the rider still has a lot of input into how to change the bike.

“So because it’s all new – the switches and buttons are new – it was just about understanding what those changes allow the bike to do and how it would affect the lap time.

“We were very consistent during that run but it highlighted a few areas we can still improve on.

“I finished the run with a smile because it felt like it was quite competitive and it certainly makes us feel ready for racing.”

Looking ahead to the Portimao test, the record 119-time race winner added: “I think you can always improve if you have more and more laps and more and more settings.

“We have a few more test items to try and get through at Portimao but it will be more a case of just laps, understanding how changes influence the bike and me learning about that, and the mechanics learning about me.

“But the package is working really well so far, the crew have been fantastic, I’m building a real bond with everybody so hopefully we can continue that.”