Jonathan Rea vows to rebound from “confidence issues” on woeful Yamaha debut
"We got rid of some of the confidence issues I had," Jonathan Rea insists
Jonathan Rea is targeting a more productive World Superbikes round with new team Yamaha this weekend.
The second round of the 2024 WorldSBK championship at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya comes after Rea was able to enjoy two beneficial days of testing his Yamaha.
Previously, at Phillip Island, his post-Kawasaki era got off to a dreadful start with a big crash in Race 2 at the opening round.
Six-time champion Rea said in Barcelona: “It’s a nice track and we have an added benefit of testing here last week, so we already feel ahead of the race weekend.
“We got rid of some of the confidence issues I had in Australia and drew a line under some of the issues from a setup point of view.
“After the crash, I’m fully recovered. WorldSBK is so competitive, not just for the front positions but if you have a tough weekend, you’re going to be down the order by quite some way.
“We still need to improve the tyre consumption although the most positive thing is we did the race simulation and we know how the bike behaves.
“We know the last couple of laps here can be critical. I think a podium is a realistic target but we’re still some way off targeting a race win, but that battle for the podium is hotly contested so I expect it to be a lot of guys, but I feel like one of the guys that can fight for that.”
Yamaha teammate Andrea Locatelli came second to Nicolo Bulega in Race 1 at Phillip Island.
He impressively overtook Andrea Iannone, Alex Lowes and Toprak Razgatlioglu to claim an impressive P2 finish.
Locatelli said ahead of this weekend’s second round in Barcelona: “I’m feeling better, after the test I felt pain in my left knee, but I improved this week.
“It’s important to get back on track because the feeling at and after Phillip Island was amazing.
“This is another track, but we can be fast. Never say never because the potential we have is quite high.
“We need to take an opportunity. This track is tricky at the end of the race with the tyre.
“I think we can stay in front during the race. At Phillip Island, we were close to fighting for victory but lost that chance.
“We are really close and have many races this year, so the target is to bring home a lot of podiums and, at the same time, is trying to fight for the win. I believe in it. We showed our potential.
“I hope it comes sooner rather than later but we will have an opportunity!”
James was a sports journalist at Sky Sports for a decade covering everything from American sports, to football, to F1.
