Honda's Jonathan Rea isn't leaving anything to chance for Sunday's World Superbike double-header after changeable weather at the Dutch circuit today saw him go out on intermediate tyres and not feel too comfortable with the feedback he was getting.
The Isle of Man resident reckons that he has completely changed his dry setup from last year and although is still looking for some front-end feel he is heading in the right direction. Weather forecasts for Sunday tell of more changeable weather, so Rea is covering all eventualities.
"My guys in the pitbox were monitoring the weather really closely and we could see on the radar that bang on 3.30 there was going to be a shower, with more to follow. So we knew that the first lap was going to be crucial and went out with the softer tyre but already on the first lap I got some spray on my visor. So you could say I took a slightly more conservative approach to getting a banker in, and even then it was getting heavier," said Rea.
"How the other guys went the same speed as they did in the first session is beyond me – I wasn’t wanting to take too many risks. In the free practice we made some OK steps with the bike, which is completely different to the race set-up we had here last year. I’m still lacking a little bit of front-end feel but I think it’s the right way to go and we’re slowly getting it sorted.
"So, this afternoon was a bit of a wasted session – I was the only guy to go out on intermediate tyres and the feeling from them wasn’t that good to be honest. If it’s like this again tomorrow, I’ll take to opportunity to go out and build my speed on them because it looks like Sunday might be the same conditions that we had today."
