Jonathan Rea on top after day one at Phillip Island in Australia but cautions over recent end-of-race struggles

Rea narrowly held off new world champion Alvaro Bautista (Aruba.it Ducati) in FP1 by only 0.022s, with Toprak Razgatlioglu (Pata Yamaha) 0.3s further back in third place.

In the afternoon session, Rea again led the way on his Kawasaki as the 35-year-old ended Friday on top by a tenth of a second from Spaniard Bautista, with Alex Lowes (Kawasaki Racing Team) moving up to third spot ahead of Razgatlioglu.

Ulsterman Rea is in the midst of his longest run without a race win since joining Kawasaki in 2015. He has won five times this year and last scaled the top step of the podium with a double at Estoril in Portugal in May.

Rea, though, says his only objective is to be strong at the finish of this weekend’s races after struggling to match Bautista and Razgatlioglu over a full race distance in recent rounds.

“Like I said in the last races, we’ve been quite far from Alvaro and Toprak in terms of race time,” he said.

“At the end of the race, we’ve been struggling. My only target is just trying to be there at the end, keep consistent, give my 100 per cent and if it’s possible to do well then so be it. I try not to worry about them.

“Alvaro’s already done his job this season and with Toprak we’re still fighting for second in the championship” he added.

“He has a big gap, but anything can happen with the forecast. With my pace being good, we can fight at the front and try to take it to the last race at least.”

The Ulsterman is third in the standings but is 37 points behind 2021 champion Razgatlioglu with the final three races to go.

Saturday’s first race is at 05:00 GMT with the Superpole race on Sunday scheduled for 02:00 GMT. Race two will be held at 05:00 GMT as the iconi circuit returns to the calendar for the first time since 2020.