Yesterday Honda’s World Superbike team officially debuted their new 2012 livery, while taking part in the two day official test at Phillip Island.

Jonathan Rea and Hiroshi Aoyama tested a number of components for their machines, including electronics, chassis and suspension settings and a new swingarm on their CBR 1000RRs ahead of this weekend’s opening round double header at the Australian venue.

Rea set the fourth best time overall (1.31.913) and according to Carlos Checa, the Honda rider still remains a sort of mystery regarding his true potential for this Sunday’s races. Hiroshi Aoyama was nowhere near entering the top ten (14th and 1.3s adrift) and he still says he’s adapting to riding a Superbike.

It’s been really good to get out on track with our rivals at this test because during our winter testing – in Qatar in December and here last month – we’ve been on our own,” said Rea. “We’re where we kind of expected to be and we know that to win here is going to be a very big task. Carlos [Checa] is riding very well and consistently but we’re still changing things on the bike because I’m still not 100% satisfied with the set-up. It’s been really good just be on track with the others though, and I’m really enjoying riding bike. I can really feel what the bike’s doing and the electronics are working really well. I’m looking forward to a couple of days off now before we go into Friday’s sessions. We found a bit of a direction with a harder rear and, although the tyre choice in this test has been clear, the race weekend is going to be different again. We played around with springs towards the end of that final session and I was able to lap OK with a harder spring, even when the tyre was worn. That’s a positive and so it’s what we’ll take into Friday morning and move into the new season from there.”

Hiroshi Aoyama commented, “These two days I have learned a lot more and one thing in particular: that this is a very tough championship! We have been working more on the bike and it’s been good to get more laps and try some set up changes. We’ve found some positive things, especially on corner exit, but other things have not been so good. So we have concentrated on the positive and worked on that to move things forward. At the moment, there is a gap to the top riders, so I hope to catch up a little bit during this first race weekend because I believe there is still some space to improve. It seems that when the conditions and temperatures change here, the feeling with the bike is a little different and, because I don’t have so much experience on the bike, this has been a little difficult. It’s something that is helped not only by changing the setting – I must adapt, too, and I am learning to do this but I still need some more time. We weren’t able to do so many long runs during this test but we have still found out some ways to improve the tyre life here. Now we just need to get a better lap time.”

(no votes)

0 comments