Rea 'as ready as I'll ever be to start racing', Redding wants 'solutions'

With Rea, Razgatlioglu and Bautista all delivering impressive performances during pre-season testing, the 2022 WorldSBK campaign, which gets underway this weekend in Aragon, promises to be an intense battle. 

After topping the two-day Catalunya test, reigning world champion Razgatlioglu had to play second best at MotorLand Aragon as Rea proved unstoppable. 

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Razgatlioglu has never won at the Spanish circuit, and although we’ve never seen a better version of the Yamaha rider, could that be advantageous to Rea, who himself has 8 race wins at Aragon. 

Speaking after the final pre-season test, Rea feels he’s as ready 'as I’ll ever be' ahead of a season in which he’s aiming to win an unprecedented seventh World Superbike title.  

Rea said: "Step-by-step we have built the package at this test. The afternoon sessions were much better than the first morning. We got meaningful work done and we confirmed our bike set-up. 

"On the last runs I was really able to clarify the package we will start the race weekend with. We also ticked a lot of boxes with tyres. 

"We used the SCQ qualifying tyre, which is new for us. We had to understand it before we use it in Superpole qualifying on Saturday. 

"I enjoyed riding the bike; I had a lot of fun and got a lot of feedback. When that happens we are able to go quite fast. 

"I am as ready as I'll ever be to start racing. You can always do more, but you have to start somewhere and if we were to go racing tomorrow I am happy enough to start."

Bautista ready to challenge for WorldSBK title?

Expect Rea and Razgatlioglu to be at the front throughout this weekend, however, another name to watch out for is Bautista. 

The former MotoGP rider has looked very impressive since returning to Ducati, even though crashes have hampered his testing program at times. 

A three-time race winner around the Teruel-based circuit, Bautista has experience of getting the better of Rea, something that should he repeat it this weekend would go a long way to proving his status as a title favourite in 2022. 

Whether it’s race pace of particularly one lap performance, the Spaniard has had knack for being at the front since his return, which will be a very pleasant sight for Ducati after the Bologna-based manufacturer re-signed Bautista for one reason only, to win their first title since 2011.  

Redding and BMW are not yet ready.

One rider who is unlikely to be a contender, at least for the first few rounds, is Scott Redding. 

The new BMW rider once again struggled during the Aragon test, while confirming ‘solutions’ need to be found in order for the German manufacturer to move forward.

"Because of the cold track conditions it was hard to do the work really consistently, but we were working on a few things. One of them was rear grip; we are still struggling in that area at the moment," added Redding. 

"In the end it was another circuit we have come to, it was a bit different, so we had to play a lot with the bike set-up to get more of a feeling but we are still not achieving the feeling that we want to have so we still have some more work to do. 

"Now I am looking forward to the first race on the BMW. It’s going to be hard, for sure, but this is where we can collect more race data for me to ride with the other guys and understand the riding style a little bit more. 

"The expectation? We need to see. At the moment we are not quite where we want to be but we have a couple of days to come with some more solutions and then we’ll try again and see if we can improve."