Jonathan Rea will start tomorrow’s eighth-round World Superbike championship races at the Moscow Raceway from the front of the second row after setting the fourth fastest time in this afternoon’s Superpole sessions.

In the first fully-dry conditions of the day, the 26-year-old from Northern Ireland set a time of 1m35.058s at the 3.931km circuit, which lies 77km west of the Russian capital. Rea was just 0.3s from the pole position time set by Italian Davide Giugliano, and one tenth off a front row start.

Rea’s Pata Honda team-mate, Leon Haslam, was left frustrated after an electronics issue prevented his progressing beyond Superpole 1 this afternoon. The 30-year-old from Derbyshire in England will start from 13th place in tomorrow’s two 25-lap races.

Jonathan Rea – P4 1m35.058s

We made a pretty big set-up change for today but it was wet this morning and conditions in free practice were not perfect, either. So, Superpole 1 was the first time we got to try it properly on a race tyre. It didn’t feel right straight away, so I was questioning the changes. But we stuck with it for Superpole 2 and I went nine tenths quicker on the same code of tyre, which also looked much grippier on the data. When we checked the tyre batch numbers, they were completely different, so there’s a real consistency issue there. I wanted to be on the front row today but it wasn’t to be. I struggled a lot on the straight, but I think the guys can put in a fresh engine tonight, which should put us back in the ball-park for speed tomorrow. They’ve done a good job with the bike in the technical sectors where CBR’s working well and I think I’m riding pretty well. Tomorrow I need two clean starts because it’s hard to pass here. We’ve done some good work on old tyres, but the front is still a question mark because I’ve been between the hard and the medium all weekend, so that’s a decision we’ll have to make tonight.

Leon Haslam – P13 1m36.069s

I felt pretty confident going into Superpole but we had an electronics problem which kind of determined the result for us, really. And that was that. I was fourth quickest in the wet qualifying session this morning and we made good progress with the setting there, so I was happy with that. In the intermediate conditions for free practice we only got a couple of laps, so that was a bit of a wasted session. But on every Superpole lap I had the electronics problem and I was nowhere near where I should have been on the time. Even then, I only missed out on Superpole 2 by a tenth. We haven’t really done many longer runs in the dry and we have to sort this problem, so it’s difficult to say how tomorrow will go. But I’m sure we can have a good go at it.

Pieter Breddels – technical co-ordinator

Conditions were not good today, so we couldn’t really test the plans we had for Leon. Then he had a problem in Superpole and he could not get beyond Superpole 1. We’ll work hard tonight and see what we can provide for him tomorrow. Jonathan had the same weather conditions and he got a bad race tyre for Superpole but he got through anyway. In Superpole 2 the same spec tyre worked, so apparently there is a problem with the consistency of the tyres. In the end he was fourth, so well done to him. We have one or two problems to look at but I think Jonathan can be a podium runner tomorrow.

Qualifying position

1 Davide Giugliano 1'34.676 (SP3) ITA APRILIA Althea Racing
2 Chaz Davies 1'34.833 GBR BMW BMW Motorrad GoldBet SBK Team
3 Eugene Laverty 1'34.934 IRL APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team
4 Jonathan Rea 1'35.058 GBR HONDA Pata Honda
5 Marco Melandri 1'35.115 ITA BMW BMW Motorrad GoldBet SBK Team
6 Carlos Checa 1'35.220 SPA DUCATI Team Ducati Alstare
7 Jules Cluzel 1'35.256 FRA SUZUKI Fixi Crescent Suzuki
8 Sylvain Guintoli 1'36.113 FRA APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team
9 Tom Sykes 1'35.761 GBR KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team
10 Leon Camier 1'35.788 (SP2) GBR SUZUKI Fixi Crescent Suzuki
11 Max Neukirchner 1'36.033 GER DUCATI MR-Racing
12 Loris Baz 1'36.069 FRA KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team
13 Leon Haslam 1'36.286 (SP1) GBR HONDA Pata Honda
14 Ayrton Badovini 1'36.329 ITA DUCATI Team Ducati Alstare
15 Michel Fabrizio 1'38.048 ITA APRILIA Red Devils Roma
16 Federico Sandi 1'39.079 ITA KAWASAKI Pedercini Team
17 Vittorio Iannuzzo 1'39.079 ITA BMW Team Grillini Dentalmatic
18 Lorenzo Savadori 1'39.504 ITA KAWASAKI Pedercini Team

Championship standings

1 Tom Sykes 235 pts GBR KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team
2 Sylvain Guintoli 229 pts FRA APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team
3 Eugene Laverty 191 pts IRL APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team
4 Marco Melandri 182 pts ITA BMW BMW Motorrad GoldBet SBK Team
5 Chaz Davies 154 pts GBR BMW BMW Motorrad GoldBet SBK Team
6 Loris Baz 136 pts FRA KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team
7 Jonathan Rea 125 pts GBR HONDA Pata Honda
8 Michel Fabrizio 120 pts ITA APRILIA Red Devils Roma
9 Davide Giugliano 99 pts ITA APRILIA Althea Racing
10 Leon Camier 80 pts GBR SUZUKI Fixi Crescent Suzuki
11 Jules Cluzel 77 pts FRA SUZUKI Fixi Crescent Suzuki
12 Max Neukirchner 60 pts GER DUCATI MR-Racing
13 Carlos Checa 59 pts SPA DUCATI Team Ducati Alstare
14 Ayrton Badovini 59 pts ITA DUCATI Team Ducati Alstare
15 Leon Haslam 42 pts GBR HONDA Pata Honda
16 Federico Sandi 28 pts ITA KAWASAKI Pedercini Team
17 Ivan Clementi 18 pts ITA BMW HTM Racing
18 Vittorio Iannuzzo 15 pts ITA BMW Team Grillini Dentalmatic
19 Niccolo Canepa 11 pts ITA DUCATI Team Ducati Alstare
20 Alexander Lundh 10 pts SWE KAWASAKI Pedercini Team
21 Fabrizio Lai 8 pts FRA KAWASAKI Pedercini Team
22 Glen Allerton 6 pts AUS BMW Next Gen Motorsports
23 Jamie Stauffer 4 pts AUS HONDA Team Honda Racing
24 Noriyuki Haga 2 pts JPN BMW Team Grillini Dentalmatic
25 Mark Aitchinson 2 pts AUS DUCATI Team Effenbert Liberty Racing
26 Kosuke Akiyoshi 2 pts JPN HONDA Pata Honda

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