‘Very happy’ Rea warns he’s just ‘scratched surface’ of new Kawasaki ZX-10RR

Jonathan Rea says he is merely ‘scratching the surface’ aboard the latest generation Kawasaki ZX-10RR as he officially concluded another successful WorldSBK season in 2020 with a two-day Motorland Aragon test.

Fresh from winning his sixth consecutive WorldSBK title this year, Rea has spent the post-season winter tests getting acquainted with the machine Kawasaki hopes will maintain both its and the Ulsterman’s formidable run of championship wins in 2021.

After getting to within just a tenth of the lap record when it burst out of the box in Jerez last week, the ZX-10RR  - distinguished by its distinctive but somewhat divisive front-end - was on good form in Aragon too, stopping the clock at 1m 49.716s. 

MotoGP 2020 Riders' Championship Race Visualised

That compares with a Teruel WorldSBK Superpole time of 1m 48.767s held in much warmer conditions and during a second consecutive race weekend.

Declaring himself ‘very happy’ with his brand-new equipment, Rea warns rivals there is still more to come from what appears already to be a quick bike.

“It was a positive day because we kept working with the items we had from the Jerez test. We really worked step-by-step on the engine side to really understand all the different feelings I have, all the different parameters we can exploit with the bike and we can draw some really good conclusions.”

“We started work with some chassis items and that list is still growing so what we can’t finish in this test at MotorLand, we’ll take forward to the 2021 pre-season tests. 

“All-in-all, I’m very happy. Lap times are very fast. I feel good on the bike, but I still know the potential is much better because we’re just scratching the surface with the new items.”