Aruba Ducati’s Alvaro Bautista led the first day of the final official tests before the start of the 2019 WorldSBK season, setting a 1’30.743 best lap to take himself 0.403 seconds clear of the official Yamaha of Alex Lowes.
Bautista’s Panigale V4R set consistently high top speeds down the main straight at PI, almost hitting 315kmph on three occasions, partly by making use of his bike’s very high rev ceiling.
Jonathan Rea (KRT) suffered a crash at turn ten in the opening session, finishing third overall on the first day’s ranking.
Tom Sykes (BMW) proved himself to be one of the few riders able to improve their best time in the windy afternoon session, taking the new official S1000RR BMW to fourth best time, just over half a second from Bautista’s best.
Leon Haslam was just behind Sykes on the second official Kawasaki, also improving his best time in the second session of the day.
The top six on day one was rounded out by the GRT Yamaha of Marco Melandri. He was 0.702 seconds behind Bautista.
Michael van der Mark (Pata Yamaha) was just a tenth behind Melandri, in seventh overall, with the final Yamaha rider Sandro Cortese in eighth place.
Younger riders Markus Reiterberger (BMW Motorrad) and Toprak Razgatlioglu (Turkish Puccetti Racing) completed the top ten.
The top Honda rider, as expected at this stage, was Leon Camier (Moriwaki Althea). He was 11th fastest, and 1.716 seconds from the best time.
Chaz Davies struggled on his official Ducati again, ending up 13th, with Eugene Laverty (Go Eleven Ducati) 15th. Local wildcard Penrite Honda rider Troy Herfoss was 19th of the 19 riders, with a 1’34.961 best lap.
One more day of testing remains, before the new-look three-race weekend starts on Friday the 22nd of February.
