JG Speedfit Kawasaki’s Leon Haslam set the quickest time on the second day of MCE British Superbike testing at Snetterton which was cut short just after lunch as a biblical thunderstorm put paid to any useful setup work.
Haslam, who had never ridden on the Snetterton 300 layout until yesterday morning, put in a 1’48.277 to be a tenth slower than the time Michael Laverty set yesterday but a tenth quicker than Honda’s Jason O’Halloran whose best was a 1’48.438.
The Derby rider didn’t get a huge amount of track time yesterday as his team made adjustments to a new tank and seat unit but today Haslam got in 26 laps before the heavens opened and was pleased with the results.
“It ended up pretty good. Yesterday was hard work with a couple of issues and ECU problems but we managed to fix all that. It has been nice to get some dry laps at a track that is new to me. I didn’t get many yesterday, so getting it all together with a bike that was working well was good, and I was happy to be quickest,” Haslam told bikesportnews.com at the track.
“I concentrated on the SC2 front and SC0 rear tyres. The plan was to put in an SC1 to see what the tyre life is like on that but it rained. We have made some improvements and doing 1’48s after ten laps and they were coming relatively easily.”
Australian O’Halloran steadily improved his pace over the course of the two days and ended just quicker than four-time champion Shane Byrne, who only got three sessions as he was available for the first two yesterday. The Be Wiser Ducati man finished on a 1’48.417.
Luke Mossey’s time from yesterday was enough for him to remain in fifth place overall while Dan Linfoot, who opted for the harder SC2 front as he did at Brands, got down to a 1’48.514 today. The Yorkshire rider made some geometry changes overnight and found almost 1.5s. He was due to try some 2016-spec Ohlins forks this afternoon but the rain put paid to that.
Alastair Seeley put the RAF Reserves BMW in seventh place with his laptime from yesterday while James Ellison’s final lap of today put him in eighth overall and fourth for the day after spending time working on a new spec of fork from Showa.
Byrne’s young team-mate Glenn Irwin finished in ninth while Tommy Bridewell, the only rider to venture out in the wet, rounded out the top ten.
