If, since the beginning of winter, Michael Rinaldi seems to be progressing and slowly but surely putting pressure on the reigning world champion Alvaro Bautista within the team, Andrea Locatelli was not to be outdone at the spectacular Phillip Island coastal circuit for the two days of official testing for the 2023 FIM Superbike World Championship.
The Italian rider of the Pata Yamaha Prometeon WorldSBK team, after completing a comprehensive testing program to refine the basic settings of his Yamaha R1 WorldSBK and test development parts to help Iwata engineers define the directions futures, in fact obtained 2nd place in the combined ranking of the two days after completing a total of 188 laps.
Andrea Locatelli was therefore particularly impressive, not only by completing 75 laps on Monday and 113 additional laps on Tuesday, including two long race simulations, but also by achieving the second best time with a 1'30.344, less than a tenth from the first place ofAlvaro Bautista. The Italian thus continued to strengthen the milestone reached since the last part of the 2022 season and throughout the winter testing.
Obviously very happy, number 55 even relegates his famous teammate Toprak Razgatlıoğlu to 3 tenths of a second, even if many pilots suspect the Turk of having hidden his game...
The 4,445km Phillip Island circuit is renowned for its speed and particularly abrasive surface, requiring tire conservation strategies and adjustments to maintain rear grip in the latter stages of the race. We will therefore see who has done their homework on Friday morning, with the first free practice session of 2023 at 01:30 a.m. French time. Will the 2023 season be that of teammates?
Andrea Locatelli : " Yesterday's sensations were really good, I enjoyed this test and it was quite unexpected! I love driving on this circuit, it's a bit special for me! When we finish the day we go home and it feels like home, but Phillip Island is also a very beautiful circuit because when you ride you see the ocean and it's something different. I'm really happy with these two days because we were really fast from the first day, and I think we were fast in every session, so that's a good point.
The feeling with the bike was incredible in all sessions and I felt at home on the R1. The test went extremely well. We worked well in every session and on Tuesday afternoon I did a race simulation to see if we could finish the bike. Everything we have worked on is working and the feeling on the Yamaha is excellent. Now we have to focus on the race weekend. To be honest, I think we are close to being ready and we have a very good package, so we have to have confidence and believe in it! Overall I'm more confident with the bike, we worked really well during winter testing and also here at Phillip Island so I think we're ready to fight »
Combined results WSBK Superbike Test Phillip Island:
Combined results WSBK Superbike Test Phillip Island J2: 
Classification credit: Worldsbk.com
