Jonathan Rea set a new Losail lap record to grab pole for the first race of the Qatar World Superbike weekend, with Yamaha’s Alex Lowes his closest challenger in second.
New world champion Rea comes into this weekend seeking to better Colin Edwards’ record points tally of 552 from 2002, and has been in imperious form throughout practice.
The Kawasaki rider shot to the top of the pile at the end of his first flying lap on race rubber, Rea going nine tenths clear of the field with a 1m56.933s.
His advantage was cut to six tenths by Lowes, but Rea was not to be denied a sixth pole of 2017 as he began to light up the timing screens on his qualifying tyre lap.
Rea blitzed the old lap record with a 1m56.228s, and no-one could put him under threat on their final efforts.
Yamaha’s Lowes was once again his nearest challenger, the Briton getting to within half a second of the Kawasaki rider for his best Superpole result of the year in second. Tom Sykes completed the top three.
Milwaukee Aprilia’s Lorenzo Savadori headed row two, though only by a few hundredths of a second from Barni Racing’s Xavi Fores and Aprilia team-mate Eugene Laverty.
Michael van der Mark took seventh at the chequered flag on the sister Pata R1 – some nine tenths down on his team-mate‘s pace – while Chaz Davies could only manage eighth ahead of Aruba.it Ducati stablemate Marco Melandri, who was struck by a technical issue at the end of the session.
SP1 pacesetter Sylvain Guintoli guided his Puccetti Kawasaki to 10th with a 1m57.985s, with Jordi Torres edging ahead of the man he will replace at MV Agusta next season Leon Camier.
Althea BMW’s Raffaele De Rosa was set to progress through to the second session, but was denied by Guintoli at the death and will line up 13th ahead of Allesandro Andreaozzi – who secured Guandalini Yamaha’s best Superpole result of the year.
Davide Giugliano was top Honda in SP1 in 15th, with Roman Ramos on the Team Go Eleven ZX-10RR and WorldSBK Jeremy Guarnoni on the Pedercini Kawasaki slotting in behind the Italian.
Jake Gagne will line up 18th on the sister Red Bull Honda, while Ondrej Jezek and Roberto Rolfo complete the 20-strong field for the first race of weekend later tonight.
