Rea keeps clear of van der Mark to start Misano on top

Full Misano WorldSBK FP1 results

Jonathan Rea has maintained Kawasaki’s previous dominance at Misano by topping the opening World Superbike practice session ahead of Michael van der Mark and Alvaro Bautista.

The reigning World Superbike champion is eager to put a frustrating Jerez round behind him and has started strongly by securing top spot at the Italian circuit in FP1 with a 1m 36.029s.

Pata Yamaha’s van der Mark closed the gap to within two-tenths on Rea as he upped his pace in the closing minutes of the session but was denied further progress due to traffic on track during his late fast laps.

But the Dutch rider did push championship leader Bautista into third place, 0.234s off Rea, leading the Aruba.it Racing Ducati charge.

Alex Lowes grabbed fourth spot on the Pata Yamaha ahead of Chaz Davies on the factory Ducati with Tom Sykes heading up the BMW charge in sixth place.

Marco Melandri slotted into seventh place for GRT Yamaha ahead of Kawasaki’s Leon Haslam who continues to struggle to match the pace of his team-mate. Sandro Cortese (GRT Yamaha) and Toprak Razgatlioglu (Puccetti Kawasaki) rounded out the top 10 ahead of Michael Ruben Rinaldi (Barni Ducati) and Markus Reiterberger (BMW).

Wildcard Samuele Cavalieri impressed in 13th place on the Motorcorsa Ducati, edging out Ducati MotoGP test rider Michele Pirro in 14th place, who is taking part in a one-off outing with Barni Ducati, after the Italian recovered from an early fall at Turn 13.

Loris Baz rounded out the top 15 contenders on the Ten Kate SBK Yamaha as the Dutch squad continues to get up to speed in the championship after returning at the Jerez round last time out.