He said he no longer wanted to be satisfied and here he is keeping his promises: Michael Ruben Rinaldi raises his voice on the first day of testing in Portimao and climbs to the top of the time classification, even mocking the 3 top riders. However, the times are all very similar and the first four are enclosed in just over two tenths.
1’39”639 is the time of the Aruba driver, who right at the end of the day gets ahead of the one who dominated the afternoon session: Jonathan Rea. Less in the shadows than in the Jerez tests, the Kawasaki rider also climbed to the top of the times classification, only to lose it by just 61 thousandths, in favor of the Ducati rider from Romagna.
The six-time world champion is sandwiched between the two factory Panigale V4Rs, with Alvaro Bautista in third position. The reigning world champion crashed in the morning but that didn’t stop him from continuing to show great pace on the four-cylinder bike. The Spaniard pays 68 thousandths of a second from his teammate but has shown that he has great confidence with the bike that bears the number 1 on the front fairing.
Closes the group of top riders Toprak Razgatlioglu, who concludes Day 1 in fourth position. Compared to the others, the Yamaha rider was slower, but we’re talking about two tenths and the stopwatch is certainly not one of the primary objectives of the test. The Turk precedes his teammate Andrea Locatelli, who is fifth in fifth position at the end of the first day.
Honda continues to work hard to be able to provide its riders with a competitive bike, the first of its riders is Xavi Vierge, sixth and protagonist of a crash in the early afternoon, fortunately without consequences. Alex Lowes also crashed, destroying his Kawasaki but not suffering any physical damage. The Briton finished in seventh position.
Eighth time for Iker Lecuona with the other Honda, while closing the top 10 we find Remy Gardner riding the GRT team Yamaha and Garrett Gerloff with the Bonovo team BMW, in ninth and tenth position respectively. Scott Redding remained on the edge of the top ten, behind his brand mate and newcomer.
Danilo Petrucci remained behind, who had already shown good confidence in the Jerez tests, but ended Day 1 in Portimao in 15th position. However, the rider from Terni is still working to adapt to the Superbike and the Panigale V4R of the Barni team. He pays over a second and a half from the lead but still precedes Axel Bassani who didn’t go beyond the 18th time trial.
Accompanying the Superbike riders were several Supersport teams, as usual. The best of these was once again Nicolò Bulega, author of the fastest time trial as well as in Jerez ahead of his compatriot Federico Caricasulo. Raffaele De Rosa and Valentin Debise follow, while Stefano Manzi precedes Yari Montella.
In Portimao, some MotoGP riders also took the opportunity to ride together with the production derivatives and on Day 1 Miguel Oliveira and Jorge Martin took to the track. The Portuguese lapped on his home track, while the Spaniard tested with the road Ducati.
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