Milwaukee Yamaha’s Josh Brookes continued his reign at the top of the MCE Insurance British Superbike Championship by topping the times in both free practice session at Assen, whilst team-mate Jakub Smrz impressed on his debut in fourth position.

Brookes had been pushing the times forward throughout the two sessions despite the changing conditions of the afternoon practice and the Australian continued to build the momentum despite a small crash in the morning.

Smrz impressed as he had his first taste of the Milwaukee Yamaha to push up the order and move ahead of the other five Title Fighters ahead of tomorrow’s qualifying session.
 


Josh Brookes

“I was quite surprised this morning as I slipped off the paint line on the edge of the track because I was not focussed on what I was doing, thinking ahead about the marshals on the track. I had an eye on the on the track and drifted too wide – I was a little tentative coming back onto the track afterwards and it gave the guys a lot of work on the bike, for something that was avoidable.

“Then it was a case of not making any mistakes and to go to the top of the session, then after the rain in the afternoon I sat time out, waiting for the track to dry. I was able to go out, get into the rhythm that I know that I can here and I did that. I am just focussed on myself - everyone will be trying to do their best, either to try for the title, or with jobs for next season in mind.

"I will be working hard, concentrating, trying to give my team the feed back to keep on improving the bike, trying to win again."  
 


Jakub Smrz

"First of all thanks to Milwaukee Yamaha and Shaun Muir for getting me back on a race bike. The first session was going very easy to get the first feeling with the setup and handlebars and then it was a case of getting back on the pace after few months off.

"After some changes for FP2 everything went very well and I felt lot better on the Yamaha R1. I started to understand a little more what I needed to change and improve and now we have more information and data for tomorrow. I enjoyed riding a lot today and that was our plan. Tomorrow we will continue in our work!“