Jonathan Rea “felt like I was miles away” in Jerez World Superbike Race 1

After enjoying his best race results of 2024 in Estoril one week ago, Jonathan Rea suffered a much more disappointing race in the first outing at this weekend’s Spanish Round at Jerez.

Rea’s poor Saturday began in Superpole, qualifying down in 16th, and even though he made a strong start to the race he was unable to make much progress after the first corners.

“I got an okay start, found myself in better track position from P16 into turn one,” Rea told WorldSBK.com.

“From there, it was honestly really tough. I felt like I was fighting the bike, the temperature went up from what we used most of the weekend.

“The bike felt out of balance, both front and rear, I had a lot of warnings from the front and I just felt something like a hinge in the middle of the bike, like on the edge of the tyre [there was] no traction.

“So, a lot of things to work on. I felt like I was miles away, I wasn’t enjoying the bike at all.

“But, overall, it doesn’t take too much of an improvement to put us back in that gaggle that was the battle for fifth, back to where I was in P11.”

Rea added that, although he tried to be as clear as possible in his technical debrief after the race, he was unsure exactly what to do to make progress.

“I tried to be as clear as I could,” he said, “but it’s very difficult to know what to do to improve tomorrow.”

Rea’s Pata Prometeon Yamaha teammate, Andrea Locatelli, had a much better Saturday than Rea, finishing third. However, Rea said there wasn’t much he could learn from his teammate.

“It’s different riding styles and different setups,” Rea explained. “Just bolting in his setup, which is quite different to mine, is not going to work because it takes time; he brakes in quite a different way, he demands things from the bike that are really different.

“So, I’m not sure what I can learn there. But it’s really encouraging to know that he did a really good race, put the Yamaha R1 on the podium.

“So, that’s the benchmark, that’s where I should be. Just now, I don’t feel like I’m in the ballpark with my base setup.

“We’ll try to work on that because I should be there, I feel like I should be at least the same level as my teammate, so work to do, for sure.”