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HANNspree Ten Kate Honda>> Rea imperious in Nurburgring rain

September 05 2009

Ten Kate Racing - Nieuwsbrief

Hannspree Ten Kate Honda’s Jonathan Rea set the fastest time in today’s wet opening qualifying session for Sunday’s 11th-round World Superbike championship races at Nurburgring in Germany.

The 22-year-old spent most of the hour-long session – some of which was held in torrential rain – at the top of the timing sheets with a comfortable 1.5-second margin. The gap was reduced to half a second by Britain’s Tom Sykes right at the end of the session, but Rea remained comfortably the fastest rider today.

His team mate, Carlos Checa looked to be heading for a provisional front row slot with his final lap. He was slowed by another rider at the final chicane but remains comfortable in the progress made in today’s sessions.

Jonathan Rea – P1, 2’11.278s
I thought the guys in the team would have rested during the summer break but it seems they’ve been working right through, developing new things to try. We’ve been working on how the rear behaves on corner entry and the work they’ve done has helped a lot, especially in the wet today. We did a lot of laps to confirm things but I really think we’re just scratching the surface of the potential we have – it really is working. I’m feeling really at ease on the bike and with the whole way the team is working together. If I have a problem, I come in, we fix it, and I go faster again. It’s feeling really good.

Carlos Checa – P1, 2’13.550s
We worked on wet settings throughout today and the important thing is that the balance of the bike, the overall feeling on the brakes was all good. I didn’t want to risk too much in the conditions today but the last lap was OK until I got to the final chicane where another rider almost high-sided and crashed in front of me. I though I might get another lap in but the flag was down. I hope we can get some dry track time tomorrow because the forecast for Sunday is for dry conditions.

Ronald ten Kate – team manager
It was good to see both riders up to speed today. Jonathan was clearly on it from the very first moment with his bike and some new settings and he fully attacked Friday! Tomorrow may be a different ball game with some dry track time and Sunday is showing a fully dry forecast. It’s good to see that the progress we were making before the summer break is being maintained here and we look forward to some more tomorrow.

2009 World Superbike championship,
round 11 – Nurburgring, Germany
Friday qualifying – results:
1 Jonathan Rea (GBR) Hannspree Ten Kate Honda 2’11.278s
2 Tom Sykes (GBR) Yamaha 2’11.781s
3 Troy Croser (AUS) BMW 2’12.086s
4 Michel Fabrizio (ITA) Ducati 2’12.354s
5 Noriyuki Haga (JPN) Ducati 2’12.635s
6 Shane Byrne (GBR) Ducati 2’12.819s
9 Ryuichi Kiyonari (JPN) Ten Kate Honda Racing 2’13.215s
12 Carlos Checa (ESP) Hannspree Ten Kate Honda 2’15.863s

HANNspree Ten Kate Honda is sponsored by Hotbodies Racing and uses our windscreens and bodywork on all of their bikes. Hotbodies Racing specializes in manufacturing high-performance parts for high-performance sportbikes, and is the North American distribution of KR Tuned performance parts. Hotbodies Racing is the market leader in Undertails, Huggers, Windscreens, Flush-Mount Signals, Megaphone Exhausts and full-race Bodywork. Hotbodies Racing supports the sport with sponsorship around the world and encourages dealer and distributor inquiries. For more information visit: www.HOTBODIESRACING.com.