Razgatlioglu leads Yamaha 1-2-3 as inaugural WorldSBK Catalunya begins

Toprak Razgatlioglu heads up Michael van der Mark and surprise package Garrett Gerloff in WorldSBK Catalunya FP1, while Jonas Folger makes his debut

Ollie Barstow

18 Sep 2020

Razgatlioglu leads Yamaha 1-2-3 as inaugural WorldSBK Catalunya begins

2020 WorldSBK Catalunya - Free Practice Results (1)

Toprak Razgatlioglu topped the first ever official timed WorldSBK session to take place at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya as he headed up a Yamaha 1-2-3 in FP1.

Though a recognisable and well used circuit across two and four wheels, this is the first time the venue - located in Granollers, around 30 miles from Barcelona - has ever been included on the WorldSBK calendar.

Even so, the venue is better known to some than others with certain manufacturers previously testing here, including Yamaha, who locked out the top three with Razgatlioglu edging out Crescent Racing team-mate Michael van der Mark.

However, running them closely - only three tenths off the top spot - was Garrett Gerloff, the American rookie taking advantage of the venue being fairly new to both himself and his rivals to fire his GRT Junior Yamaha R1 up to third place.

The late lap unseated Alvaro Bautista, who was perched at the top of the timesheets for the majority of the session before Yamaha’s late gains shuffled him down to fourth place on the Honda.

Championship leader Jonathan Rea maintained a relatively low profile and completed limited laps but improved late on to go fifth best on the Kawasaki ZX-10RR, ahead of Aragon standout Michael Ruben Rinaldi and Alex Lowes on the second of the factory Kawasakis.

Tom Sykes was the highest-placed BMW rider in eighth position, heading off the remaining top ten dwellers of Scott Redding and Loris Baz.

Elsewhere, ex-MotoGP rider Jonas Folger made his WorldSBK bow with a solid 15th fastest of 22 riders on the Yamaha R1 he races in the German IDM Superbike series. This weekend’s event is being billed as a potential pitch for him to make the switch to the international stage full time in 2021.

However, it was a somewhat inauspicious debut for the ex-Tech 3 Yamaha rider when he struck a bird with edge of the front-end on the long home straight. Folger was undisturbed, but the same cannot be said for the bird...