Bautista tops Friday WorldSBK running at Barcelona

Aruba.it Ducati’s Alvaro Bautista claimed the opening day honours at Barcelona-Catalunya on Friday as WorldsBK testing got underway.

Bautista’s 1’40.824 topped the times with KRT’s Jonathan Rea and GRT Yamaha’s Garrett Gerloff rounding out the top three. The six-time champion completing 104 laps of the 4.6km layout. The trio of manufacturers continued in the overall standings as Michael Rinaldi, Toprak Razgatlioglu and Alex Lowes completed Friday’s six fastest finishers with the top ten covered by a second.

Kawasaki’s Rea had the early start as the Barcelona action fired up ahead of two full days of testing in Spain. GRT’s Gerloff took control in the times across midday on 1’41.9 pace with fellow Yamaha man Razgatlioglu his closest rival. Ducati’s Bautista split the two Pata machines in third as Andrea Locatelli got up to speed quickly on the tail of his championship winning teammate. The top five, down to the second Panigale of Rinaldi, were split by just two-tenths at the halfway stage of day one, with three-and-a-half hours left on the clock.

The afternoon saw Bautista in charge as he upped the pace with a 1’41.5, Rea and the leading Spaniard’s Aruba.it teammate Rinaldi improving for the top three as Loris Baz crashed out on the Bonovo BMW. The French rider had already endured technical issues in the morning’s first 30 minutes, forcing him to push his M 1000 RR back down pitlane. Further drama saw crashes for Lucas Mahias and Locatelli with a red flag halting proceedings for the latter after a turn four highside in the closing hour.

Bautista maintained his dominance as he returned to the Bologna factory after a two year sabbatical as the only rider inside the 1’40 benchmark after seven hours on track. 2021 Champion