Jonathan Rea has dismissed himself from victory contention on his Pata PROMETEON Yamaha WorldSBK debut this weekend following a troubled build-up to the Phillip Island opener and issues getting dialled into his new bike.

The Ulsterman prepares to make his ‘debut in blue’ after almost a decade with Kawasaki but after showing promising form during his initial touches with the Yamaha during pre-season testing in Jerez and Portimao, he had a much harder time during the official pre-season test at Phillip Island.

Hampered by a heavy crash that has left him with bruising to his leg, Rea admits he won’t be 100% for this weekend’s opener but is feeling better than he did.

Even so, Rea feels he hasn’t found the sweet spot of his R1 in Australia and described his preparations as ‘mixed’ so far. 

“I am more or less OK, I’m not 100%,” he admitted to WorldSBK.com. I woke up yesterday feeling quite sorry for myself, but today was much better and I am hoping tomorrow we can make another step. 

“The overall feeling… is mixed,” he continued. “I really enjoy riding the bike and working with the team, and I have been fast with the bike but to be really, really fast with the bike I am demanding some feeling, so we’re working with that track-by-track. 

“At Jerez I was able to be strong, Portimao too step-by-step arriving but the new track and surface, it just gave us a curveball, a different feeling with a lot of grip so that riding style I’d normally use isn’t quite working here. 

“Just learning, still learning but also trying to make the bike mine and use all the benefits of the R1 but also put my stamp on it.

With this in mind, Rea has modest expectations for his first outing with Yamaha and says he doesn’t expect to be emulating his race-winning turn on his debut with Kawasaki back in 2015.

“Right now, no [we aren’t among the favourites], far from it to be honest,” he smiled. 

“I feel my ultimate pace hasn’t been so fast, even my race rhythm isn’t fast, we need to improve. My feeling hasn’t been incredible here, we need to make a step here.

“Hopefully we can do a good job with our heads held high, but the main priority of the weekend is to not think about the races too much, just come away with a bagful of points and move on to start our season for real in Europe.