Kawasaki’s Jonathan Rea headed Friday’s opening WorldSBK practice at Barcelona with a 1’42.419 after leading the session from the outset.
The reigning champion was up to speed quickly as the Catalunya round fired up, his teammate Alex Lowes running third at the halfway stage with title-challenger Toprak Razgatlioglu splitting the pair in second.
A second-half charge found Tom Sykes push his BMW into third with Pata Yamaha’s Andrea Locatelli heading Leon Haslam’s Honda in the top six.
The Ducati’s of Scott Redding and Michael Ruben Rinaldi circulated in seventh and eighth as the clock counted down, before Lucas Mahias and Michael van der Mark arrived to spoil the party.
With just two minutes remaining, Rinaldi was the only front-running rider to have improved, taking sixth from the HRC mounted-Brit as Garret Gerloff entered the top eight in the closing stages. Chaz Davies unlucky to see his late charge deleted due to track limits with the Go Eleven rider sitting 15th at the chequered flag.
