World Superbikes: Jonathan Rea fourth on day one at Mandalika in Indonesia, Ducati lead way with one-two

Italy’s Michael Ruben Rinaldi and reigning champion Alvaro Bautista led a Ducati one-two on the time sheets, with Toprak Razgatlioglu – a treble winner last season – slotting into third.

Rea, joint third in the standings with Rinaldi after the first round last weekend at Phillip Island, is 31 points behind Bautista, who began the new season in perfect style with a clean sweep in Australia.

Rinaldi led the way in FP1 despite crashing at Turn 10 and again set the pace in FP2 with a time of 1m 32.468s, narrowly ahead of Bautista by only 0.030s.

Razgatlioglu was 0.157s down on his Pata Yamaha while Ulsterman Rea was seven tenths off the pace on his Kawasaki.

“The track has no rubber down and is so dirty, so the first session was a disaster,” said Rea.

“Because of the tyre allocation we just had to be conservative. I chose to only ride the last part of FP1 and even then with our normal preferred front race tyre, we destroyed it.

“In FP2 we focused with a different weight balance of the bike, trying to take weight out of the front to save the front tyre.”

Rea feels front tyre performance will have a decisive impact on this weekend’s races at Mandalika, which begin on Saturday with the first 22-lap race at 05:00 GMT.

“I think front tyres are going to determine the race outcomes,” he said.

“In comparison to last year, we have improved in this area a little bit, but where our bike makes the time is in trail braking and corner entry. And if we don’t have a stable front, then it is so difficult.

“So we are focusing to improve in that area tomorrow. Of course, I expect the track to be better tomorrow. There will be more rubber down and the track will be cleaner, which will help with front tyre life.”

Rea is aiming to put last Sunday’s lacklustre results at Phillip Island behind him after he finished seventh in the Superpole race and eighth in race two.

The 36-year-old had made a strong start to the championship with a battling runner-up finish in the wet in Saturday’s first race.

He has won twice at Mandalika and finished on the rostrum three times in the five races held at the street circuit on the island of Lombok since Indonesia joined the WSBK calendar in 2021.

And with a seven-week break until round three at Assen, Rea will be eager to collect plenty of points this weekend to keep Bautista in his sights.

Michael van der Mark (BMW Motorrad) and championship rookie Remy Gardner (GRT Yamaha) rounded out the top six.