Savadori fastest on Friday as Rea misses top 10

Ioda Racing’s Lorenzo Savadori ends the first day of track action at the Lausitzring fastest after topping the second free practice session with a 1m37.449s on his Aprilia. But the shock of the day came from championship leader Jonathan Rea, who failed to make it into the top 10 and will have to go through the first Superpole session tomorrow.

The Kawasaki rider languished at the lower reaches of the top 10 for much of FP2, and his final effort of 1m37.996s at the time was only good enough to lift him into eighth. Indeed, at the final reckoning, Rea had been bumped back to 11th whilst Savadori shot to the top of the time sheets.

Markus Reiterberger continued to prove that the Althea team are in strong shape ahead of this weekend’s races, the German delighting his home fans by going second fastest in FP2 with a 1m37.483s. Tom Sykes completed the top three on the second of the factory Kawasakis.

Chaz Davies was fourth fastest on the Aruba.it Ducati, finding seven-tenths of a second on his best lap from FP1. Honda’s Nicky Hayden rounded out the top five, and it was an impressive afternoon for sixth-placed Sylvain Guintoli. The Yamaha rider is making his first WorldSBK appearance since the Imola weekend and already looks to have reacclimatised to his R1. The Frenchman was just three-tenths of a second adrift of top spot on a 1m37.753s.

Fastest man from this morning Jordi Torres took the chequered flag in seventh ahead of Alex Lowes, who’s session was curtailed by a crash 25 minutes in at Turn 6. Leon Camier and Michael Van der Mark made up the rest of the top 10 on the combined time sheets.

Lowes wasn’t the only rider to visit the Lausitzring gravel traps. Dominic Schmitter went down at Turn 5 early in the session whilst Ant West was forced to park up at the same corner moments later with a mechanical problem. Josh Brookes lost the front-end of his Milwaukee BMW at Turn 10, the debris from the crash forcing a red flag.

Twitter: Watch @JoshBrookes walk away from his crash as the session was red flagged

FP2 has resumed

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