Rea: ‘Front in crisis, losing too much traction’ despite strong FP2 in Mandalika

Six-time WorldSBK champion Jonathan Rea had to settle for second best on day-one at Mandalika as title favourite Toprak Razgatlioglu dominated proceedings.

Rea, who faces an upward task to retain his world title - currently 30 points down on Razgatlioglu ahead of tomorrow’s first of three races this weekend, rebounded in FP2 to take second after finishing 11th in FP1.

The cause for Rea’s slow start was a technical issue which cost the Kawasaki rider more than half the session.

“When I came to the box we had a technical issue and unfortunately we couldn’t solve it until the end,” added Rea. "I was lucky that we got one out lap at the very end to check if we fixed the problem so that we didn’t waste FP2 trying to find what was wrong. 

"It was unfortunate because I spent more than half the session in the box which had a knock-on effect to learn the track. 

"But in FP2 I think I did a good salvage job to find a good rhythm, good pace, and the bike is okay. 

"I still need to improve in some areas. I think there’s a bit of margin to improve so I’m quite optimistic to fight tomorrow."

Despite being within two tenths of Razgatlioglu come the end of today’s action, Rea is still playing catch-up to the Yamaha rider who was in sensational form. Razgatlioglu topped both practices including FP1 by over 1.5 seconds. 

Rea was losing most of his time to Razgatlioglu in sector one which needs stability on the brakes, something he hopes a ‘balance change with the chassis’ can help with.

Rea said "We need to improve stability on the brakes because I’m losing too much in the final part of braking. 

"The front is in crisis and is losing a little bit of traction. I think some balance changes with the chassis and we should be there. 

"It’s something we do quite often so I'm quite optimistic to try it in FP3 and then see how we are for the Superpole. 

"The Superpole is going to be very important because track position here is key."