Carlos Checa continued his ominous form by topping the time-sheet in the first qualifying session for Sunday's opening round of the Superbike World Championship at Phillip Island in Australia.

The Spanish veteran dominated testing at the Victorian track earlier this week aboard his Althea Ducati, and he set the pace again as a lap of one minute 31.577 seconds saw him lead the Effenbert-Liberty Racing Ducati of Sylvain Guintoli by almost three tenths of a second.

Northern Ireland's Eugene Laverty made an impressive start to his first weekend with the factory Yamaha squad by setting the third fastest time with an effort 20 minutes into the hour-long session.

Defending champion Max Biaggi was next up for Aprilia, with Jakub Smrz fifth.

Leon Haslam, for BMW, was the best of the remainder of the British riders with the sixth best lap, comprehensively outpacing team-mate and two-time champion James Toseland by a full second.

Jonathan Rea was ninth on the Castrol Honda, one place behind Laverty's former Supersport rival Joan Lascorz, who was an impressive eighth for Kawasaki.

Tom Sykes was 13th on another Kawasaki, with Toseland 15th and Leon Camier 16th.

It was a difficult day for former MotoGP man Marco Melandri as the Yamaha rider, who is carrying a shoulder injury, could only manage the 12th best time after a fall early on.