Gloomy Mondello Park for start of British Superbike round

We’re half an hour away from starting of practice for the Mondello Park British Superbike round in Ireland and there’s a distinct feeling of déjà vu as far as the weather goes.

Last year’s British Superbike round was cancelled due to heavy rain and here we are again, in mid-June and it’s a miserable, overcast grey day with fine, steady drizzle falling.

The one good thing is so far, even after some pretty heavy rain yesterday, the track is free of any puddles and looks in great shape.

Since last year’s debacle, a new drainage system has been installed and large sections of the track have been resurfaced.

The resurfacing has taken out all the bumps particularly through Turn Two so, once the weather improves – and the forecast if good for Sunday’s British Superbike race day – we could see some lap records tumbling.

It’s almost a month since defending British Superbike champion Ryuichi Kiyonari won both races in the fourth round at Snetterton.

The HM Plant Honda rider leads the championship by 11 points from Gregorio Lavilla, the Airwaves Ducati rider hoping his Snetterton bad luck has passed and he can get his title bid back on track. 

Jonathan Rea, along with Ryuichi Kiyonari, has been flat out. Only last week the pair of them won the Suzuka 300km, the race being a build up to their bid for Suzuka Eight-Hour success in July. 

Jonathan Rea’s also scheduled to race in the British MotoGP at Donington next week on the Kenny Roberts Honda but right now he’s totally focussed on British Superbike.

Jonathan Rea said: “I’m looking for a strong weekend at my home race to claw back some points in the championship.”

Jonathan Rea is currently 41 points down on Ryuichi Kiyonari.