Jonathan Rea held onto top spot at the Algarve circuit, after a dominant lap in second practice for the Portugal World Superbike round put him 0.568 seconds clear of the field.
After a delayed start to proceedings – caused by an oil spill towards the end of the preceding Superstock 1000 session – improvements on first practice pace were few and far between as most focused on race runs.
Rea was the early leader with a 1m43.516s, while Ducati’s Marco Melandri – who missed much of the morning session with a bike issue – was the only significant mover in the order with a 1m44.335s in seventh.
With just a few minutes left on the clock, a flurry of fast laps were registered, and it was triple Portimao race winner Rea who came out on top with a 1m42.621s.
Melandri came close to topping the session on a few occasions, but continually lost time in the final two sectors of the lap and had to settle for second with a 1m43.207s. Team-mate Chaz Davies was third.
Leon Camier proved his morning pace was no fluke, the MV Agusta rider continuing to impress in fourth spot ahead of the second KRT bike of Tom Sykes, who was the only rider inside the top 10 not to improve on their first practice time.
Eugene Laverty completed the top six on his Milwaukee Aprilia from Yamaha’s Alex Lowes, his SMR team-mate Lorenzo Savadori and the second Pata R1 of Michael van der Mark.
Stefan Bradl secured a place inside the top 10 at the death of the session with a 1m43.957s, and this will see him pass directly into the second part of Superpole for only the second time this season.
Althea BMW’s Jordi Torres clung onto that final top 10 spot for much of the session, but will face SP1 on Saturday after being shuffled back to 11th ahead of team-mate Raffaele De Rosa.
Leandro Mercado couldn’t quite match the pace of fellow Aprilia runners Laverty and Savadori in 13th, while Xavi Fores was forced to park up with half an hour to go with a mechanical issue. Riccardo Russo rounded out the top 15.
Honda stand-in Takumi Takahashi improved significantly this afternoon, the Japanese rider knocking well over a second off of his first practice pace with a 1m46.007s to end his first day in WorldSBK 18th overall.
