WSBK Superbike Magny-Cours FP1: Jonathan Rea laughs in the rain!

As expected, it was on a wet track that the 21 Superbike riders set off this morning for their first free practice session on the Nivernais circuit.

Obviously, under such conditions, Loris Baz wasted no time in registering a first reference in 1'57.773 ahead Federico Caricasulo.

However, only two rounds were required at Jonhatan Rea to record a 1'52.747 which was already an interesting first time.

As the minutes passed, the Briton improved to 1'51. 924, preceding Tom Sykes, Michael Leverty, Michael Van Der Mark, Scott Redding and Loris Baz.

After fifteen minutes, Samuel Cavalieri, definitive replacement of  Marco Melandri, made a mistake, but 15 minutes later, it was the fall of Federico Caricasulo which led to the appearance of the red flag.

This interruption made it possible to take stock of the ranking of local drivers, with Loris Baz in 6th position, 1,690 seconds behind Jonathan Rea, Sylvain Barrier at 5,8 and Valentine Debise at 7,5 while, for information, Takumi Takahashi closed the timesheet at 13,9 seconds.

Once the motorcycle Federico Caricasulo evacuated, the session quickly restarted for a final quarter of an hour which began with a progression of Loris Baz which placed the Frenchman in provisional second position.

Tom Sykes However, he regained his possession a few minutes later despite good resistance from the Frenchman. During this time, Jonhatan Rea hit the nail on the head in 1'49.356, relegating the rest of the field to more than two seconds!

In extremis, Loris Baz managed to reduce this gap, ahead of Tom Sykes and Toprak Razgatlioglu while Michael Van Der Mark and Rinaldi made minor mistakes.

Finally, Jonhatan Rea struck a big blow this morning in Magny-Cours!