Ten Kate Honda's Jonathan Rea is looking forward to his debut World Superbike season after successful tests in mixed conditions at Portugal's Portimao track.

Rea set the third fastest time in this afternoon's simulated Superpole knockout session, behind Britain's Shane Byrne and Max Nukirchner, on the Alstare Suzuki.

"It was really good to get back on the bike again with so many other teams here as well. Unfortunately, the base setting we found at the Kyalami test before Christmas didn’t work so well here, but we’re happy with the direction we’ve found in the time available," said Rea.

"The weather’s been bad but we found something in the dry on Saturday that wasn’t too far off. We’ll finish our winter testing in Phillip Island in three weeks and then start racing there, so I can’t wait."

Team boss Ronald Ten Kate added: "The bad weather has clearly affected this test a lot and, to be really honest, it has minimised the usefulness of any information we have found.

"Although we didn’t have such a long list of new things we wanted to try, we could still have benefited from some better conditions. So, we still have some more work to carry out at the Phillip Island test, but I’m already quite positive for a strong start to the season there."