On the first day of action for the fourth round of the 2016 FIM Superbike World Championship KRT riders Tom Sykes and Jonathan Rea were second quickest and sixth quickest respectively, experiencing what were wet track conditions throughout.
                                
In the first wet race weekend for the all-new Ninja ZX-10R the 4.542km Assen circuit’s weather conditions changed from fully wet to slightly drying out at times during the opening day. Full wets were required for the first session, which started well for Sykes and Rea. They took the all-new Ninja to first and second places in the opening hour of on-track action, despite a lack of previous information about the new machine from their largely dry winter test experiences.

In the afternoon Sykes was leading until close to the end of the final hour, putting in a succession of fast and consistent laps as he learned the limits of what was an always cold and wet track surface. He was only displaced from the top spot in the overall times close to the end of the second hour, as heavier rains re-appeared for the final few minutes. The heavier rain prevented him from improving his time yet again.

Reigning champion Rea started well in the morning and was also making advances in the second session when a technical issue intervened and he pulled over, having completed five laps during the afternoon practice hour. He had already improved his first session best time, which was good enough for a top six placing from 25 riders, but he was not in a position to fight for a higher position near the end of the session.

On Saturday at Assen Sykes and Rea will face a final third practice session, Superpole 2 and then the first race of the weekend, to be held over 21 laps.

Tom Sykes stated: 

“Overall, the nature of the circuit and the track conditions means that being second fastest on day one is quite promising. The guys are working well on the Ninja ZX-10R and considering everything together I am happy with our performance. Today has been wet but the biggest problem is the low track temperature. Because we have quite low temperatures it is difficult to keep heat in the left side of the tyre. The left side is very critical here. You always have some issues with pure grip in these conditions but it is something we are working on, in case we have these conditions again tomorrow. We have some good information to sleep on and we will see what the conditions bring for Saturday.”

Jonathan Rea stated: 

“It has been strange today, especially with the weather conditions. It looks unpredictable all weekend and already on Friday we have had no dry track time. It is the same for everybody but it seems we have a good wet set-up. We did not get any wet testing during the winter time so this was the first time we rode the new bike in the wet and the first feelings were not so bad. We played around with the balance of the bike a little bit, understood how it is on track when it is both fully wet and when it is drying out, just to cover our bases for tomorrow. I got up to speed in the second session, went in to make some changes and when I went out we had an issue, which the mechanics will analyse overnight. I just hope the race conditions for Saturday are one way or another, not halfway between. Wet or dry, we should be competitive.”

Track conditions made it a challenging opening day for all Kawasaki riders and teams with replacement rider for the injured Sylvain Barrier, Lucas Mahias ((Pedercini Racing Kawasaki) 15th, Roman Ramos (Team GoEleven Kawasaki) 16th and Josh Hook (Grillini Racing Team Kawasaki) 19th.

Saeed Al Sulaiti (Pedercini Racing Kawasaki) and Dominic Schmitter (Grillini Racing Team Kawasaki) have yet to score qualifying times in the difficult track conditions.