Jonathan Rea pulled off the surprise of the day in first qualifying at Phillip Island as the Honda World Superbike man put in the only sub-1m32s lap in the last couple of minutes to head the field. Rea's time of 1'31.959 put him in front of three Ducati men, who had dominated the session until then. Second place went to Jakub Smrz on the Liberty Racing machine, followed by Superstock 1000 winner Davide Giugliano (Althea Racing) in third and Carlos Checa in fourth. The Italian rookie actually led at one point.

Max Biaggi (Aprilia Racing) was next up in fifth place ahead the Red Devils Roma Ducati of another rookie Niccolò Canepa, while the final two places on the provisional second row went to the two Kawasaki Racing Team riders, Tom Sykes and Joan Lascorz.

Joshua Brookes (Crescent Suzuki), Lascorz, Checa and Maxime Berger (Effenbert Liberty) all went off during the session, without any consequences, while Eugene Laverty (Aprilia Racing) again crashed, picking up a bump on his head, but was declared fit. Leon Haslam (BMW Motorrad) returned and did three laps to see how his recent injury from his crash earlier in the week was holding up.




Honda World Superbike rider Jonathan Rea took provisional pole position for the opening round of the 2012 World Superbike championship at Phillip Island in Australia after setting the fastest time in this afternoon’s first qualifying session.

Rea was the only rider to lap the 4.445km circuit below 1m32s, with Jakub Smrz, Davide Guigliano and reigning world champion, Carlos Checa, joining the 25-year-old Ulsterman on the provisional front row.

Rea’s Honda World Superbike team-mate, Hiroshi Aoyama, had a difficult first morning in World Superbikes, with a crash at Phillip Island’s turn two. With the new one-bike rule coming into force this season, the Japanese rider managed to get back to the pits where his crew re-built his machine for the last ten minutes of free practice.

Aoyama was 15th in this afternoon’s qualifying session, but is confident of progress in tomorrow’s practice and qualifying and is hoping to make his debut in Superpole tomorrow afternoon.

Jonathan Rea – P1, 1m31.959s

The day started quite poorly for us as we used the smaller, less preferred tyre at this track and it wasn’t going good. I got a bad rhythm and felt like I wasn’t riding good but in the afternoon we worked on a long run with the harder race tyre to see what consistency is like with that. Consistency is really good, but the lap time is not so good, so right at the very end of the session we used the softer tyre, but still the bigger one, and the lap time was good. So I know my pace is good and the bike’s working well in the conditions, but it’s still a compromise with tyres. Tomorrow we’ll do more long runs on both the tyres and make our mind up for the race, but the target’s to be on the front row, for sure.

Hiroshi Aoyama – P15, 1m33.040s

Well, for me, the first day of the superbike experience wasn’t so easy because I had one crash and some kind of trouble. We could not do what we wanted to do today so there was a little stress for everybody. I think we know what we should change for tomorrow and I hope that it’s another day to feel better.


2012 World Superbike championship - round one, Phillip Island, Australia

First qualifying results:

1 Jonathan Rea (GBR) Honda World Superbike Team 1m31.959s
2 Jakub Smrz (CZE) Ducati 1m32.116s
3 Davide Guigliano (ITA) Ducati 1m32.198s
4 Carlos Checa (ESP) Ducati 1m32.228s
5 Max Biaggi (ITA) Aprilia 1m32.318s
6 Nicola Canepa (ITA) Ducati1m32.343s
7 Tom Sykes (GBR) Kawasaki 1m32.402s
8 Joan Lascorz (ESP) Kawasaki 1m32.443s
9 Marco Melandri (ITA) BMW 1m32.553s
10 Michel Fabrizio (ITA) BMW 1m32.609s
15 Hiroshi Aoyama (JPN) Honda World Superbike Team 1m33.040s


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