LAMI OMG Racing Yamaha’s Kyle Ryde topped the leaderboard in the final British Superbike Championship free practice session at a dry but cool Brands Hatch on Saturday morning.

Blue skies and sunny weather greeted the riders albeit with a track temperature of just 7.6 degrees no rider would better their Friday afternoon efforts from FP2 to leave the order static on the combined timesheets after third practice

Even so, Ryde made it three-out-of-three on the OMG Yamaha R1, setting the pace in FP3, ahead of Leon Haslam (ROKiT BMW Motorrad Team) and Josh Brookes (FHO Racing BMW).

Ryde moved back into first mid-way through the twenty-minute session, dropping into the 1’29’s with a time of 1’29.254, with Canepa taking over third from Brookes although Ryde and Haslam continued to be considerably quicker than everyone else.

Yamaha’s Ryde continued to up the pace, moving on to a 1’28.291, which put him some 2.2s quicker than second-placed Haslam, with Brookes re-claiming third from Canepa, the duo both now lapping in the 1’31 bracket. The Italian soon jumped back ahead of Brookes though with a lap of 1’31.003.

With five minutes to go, Ryde increased his pace to a 1’27.530 which extended his advantage over Haslam to 2.504s but the BMW rider responded with a 1’28.761 and there was change further behind as Franco Bourne (Marvel HCL Motorsport Honda) moved up to third on the BSB Pathway-spec machine.

That didn’t last long though as Brookes and Nesbitt quickly overhauled him with Jack Kennedy (Mar-Train Racing Yamaha) doing likewise with a minute to go. Haslam also cut the gap to Ryde to less than half a second in the final seconds only for Ryde to post a 1’27’301 on his final lap and extend his advantage to 0.693s.

The top three remained Ryde, Haslam and Brookes with Nesbitt, Canepa, Storm Stacey (Starline Racing Kawasaki) and Kennedy following, the leading seven riders the only ones to lap below 1’30 as Bourne, Jason O’Halloran (McAMS Yamaha) and Fraser Rogers (IN Competition Aprilia) rounded out the top ten.

Tommy Bridewell only went out late on in the session with BeerMonster Ducati team-mate Glenn Irwin one of five riders who didn’t post a time in the tricky conditions.

Brands Hatch BSB | Combined Free Practice Results [After FP3]