Kawasaki’s Jonathan Rea extended his advantage over the WorldSBK pack in this afternon’s second free practice at Portimao, coming in after his customary race run to change tyres and going straight back out to set the quickest time of the weekend so far.
Rea led this morning’s sessions with a 1’43.170 and increased the gap with two sub 1’43s laps before the chequered flag, putting down a 1’42.754 in response to a 1’43.207 from Ducati’s Marco Melandri and then bettering it with a 1’42.671.
Melandri had to reply to Rea’s one-lap pace but brought himself firmly back into contention after a disastrous morning session which saw him complete only two full laps before his Panigale ceased to function. Team—mate Chaz Davies ended in third place with a 1’43.310 after having a potentially faster lap messed up by slower traffic.
In terms of pace, Rea was again the model of consistency, putting in a 13-lap run of 1’43s laps. Melandri was still doing his free practice one work in the second session while Davies managed a total of five 1’43s.
Leon Camier’s best of 1’43.415 came at the beginning of his final run but he had previously set 10 consecutive laps in the low 1’44s, so the Briton is a serious contender for his first podium of the year and ended the day in fourth place.
Tom Sykes was a little off of his usual pace but is known not to be a fan of the bumps at Portimao. He finished in fifth place and nine-tenths slower than his team-mate. There was no race simulation for the Huddersfield rider but four laps in the 1’43s.
Eugene Laverty switched places with Alex Lowes on the combined sheets, taking sixth place with a 1’43.522 as Lowes ended a little over a tenth further back.
Laverty’s Milwaukee Aprilia team-mate Lorenzo Savadori got himself into Superpole two with his penultimate lap and Michael Van Der Mark also squeezed into the top ten, finishing ninth. Stefan Bradl was the last rider to make it at the expense of Jordi Torres.
Xavi Fores hit technical problems in the session and didn’t improve on his time from this morning, so finished in 14th while Takuma Takahashi dropped his laptime by 1.3s to finish in 18th place.
