Start to forget
The adventure of Jonathan Rea with Yamaha began with results decidedly lower than expected for the six-time world champion, who only achieved the first points of this season. A 8th place which so far reflects a real sporting nightmare for the Northern Irishman, even 17th in the world championship rankings.
DNF in Race 1
Always out of the points until the last test in Spain, Rea was the protagonist of a bad fall in Race 2 at Phillip Island, later retiring from Race 1 in the last round for a clutch problem. A very disappointing start for the former Kawasaki rider, who after the no longer encouraging results with the Japanese manufacturer had decided to leave the team with which he had written history to take over from Toprak Razgatlioglu, who in turn moved to BMW and is authentic protagonist of the weekend in Spain.
Far from goals
After the first six races of the season, Rea summed up his start and performances in Catalonia as follows: “All in all, it was a very disappointing weekend – has explained – like at Phillip Island, we have made progress even if it doesn't seem like it. In race 2 we scored the first points of the season, which was a problem-free race. I struggled starting from P13 because you have to be a little more aggressive at the start. Then I had already wasted some tires and so I tried to save them as much as possible. I thought I could catch Petrucci, Gardner and Van der Mark, but I couldn't. There are some positives; It's not the time we want to be in, but we will go to Assen and try to have an open mind about what could happen. Performance must change; we had a lot of problems and we are facing them in a very positive way as a team, trying to be clear and move on.”
To Assen to improve
Rea highlighted all the difficulties encountered so far, but at the same time maintains a certain optimism about what the improvements could be in the current season: “I don't have that pace to be close to the top-10 yet – He admitted – I'm still settling in and trying to understand the bike. I'm pushing the team to give me what I need to be fast. It takes time, but I'm sure we will get there. I believe a lot in the people around me, so the credit goes to them: they deserve it as much as I do. We will continue to work, we will not give up and Assen is a favorable track for me, so there is no better place to try to score important points. You have to take these small victories; we are not fighting for the podium, which is always the goal. We need to maximize our weekends and try to stay out of trouble. The Superpole is very important; I made a mistake on my lap and therefore I have to take responsibility for it, but we probably didn't prepare in the right way and Free Practice 3 was difficult. When you start from the fifth row, your race is compromised.”
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