Jonathan Rea sights qualifying improvement

Jonathan Rea knows that he needs to improve his qualifying performance after having to fight his way up from 13th to a sixth place finish at Nurburgring last weekend. 

Throughout his debut season in the World Supersport class, Rea has shown his undoubted race pace, but is still searching for his maiden world championship win.

In Germany, Rea’s sixth place finish means that he sits 37 points off the championship leader having beaten former series leader Joan Lascorz.

Speaking to MCN about his race, Rea said: “I didn’t have any problems in the race but we had some mechanical problems with the bike during qualifying and that meant I just couldn’t put in a time and I just dropped down the leader board.

“In the restarted race I made a pretty bad start and I was fighting with the Kawasaki’s and then at the end of lap one I was in the slipstream down the straight and braked where I normally do but had to run on and lost a load of places.

“I had to pass the Kawasaki’s again, a Suzuki and a Triumph so by the time I got some clear track I was chasing down Lascorz. I put him under a lot of pressure because I was taking about three quarters of a second out of him a lap.

“A couple of laps later he crashed but I had too big a gap to close to Jonesy  (Craig Jones) so I had to settle for sixth.”