Roda full of praise for Rea, expects him to challenge ‘for a few more years’

Despite missing out on a seventh WorldSBK title in 2021, first time it’s happened since joining Kawasaki, Jonathan Rea’s team principal Guim Roda was full of praise for his rider’s efforts.

Rea put together another stunning season in 2021, one in which he easily eclipsed 500 points for the fifth time in seven years. 

The Kawasaki rider claimed the most pole positions (9), while also tying world champion Toprak Razgatlioglu with 13 wins.

However, several uncharacteristic crashes while battling the Yamaha man led to Rea needing a miracle in the final round, which was not forthcoming. 

Although he won both season finale races in Mandalika, Rea finished 13 points down on Razgatlioglu in the end. 

But with that said, it remains one of Rea’s strongest seasons in WorldSBK, which generated plenty of praise from Team Principal, Guim Roda.

Speaking to the official World Superbike website, Roda said: "The performance of Jonny honestly, I have to say is always good. It has always been surprising how much passion and effort he puts in his job. 

"He really likes this job and he really likes to perform and look for perfection. I cannot say anything bad about his performance. 

"Honestly, it is amazing to work with him, he’s a motivating rider. Even with the years and with many championships on his back, he’s still more motivated to continue winning and pushing us all together to the maximum. I expect he still can be competitive for a few more years."

As stated above, this is the first time the team has been bettered to a title since signing Rea back in 2015.

And although Roda pointed to ‘some mistakes’ being key to that, the level of competition in WorldSBK has been getting stronger and stronger, therefore this was a scenario that was inevitably going to happen.  

"When you lose, it's a big drama. When you win, it’s a fantastic moment: it's part of the general situation in racing," added Roda. 

"It has been a challenging year; we made some mistakes. Maybe we shouldn’t have but nobody's perfect. We still always have something to learn. 

"We need to take this year as a good one to understand how to improve for 2022 and how to do our job even better. 

"Sooner or later, more competition on the grid is coming because at the end, everybody is working hard. BMW are putting in a lot of effort, Honda are making even more effort than anybody, Ducati have been continuously there for many years. 

"We imagined that situation and we knew that the talent of Toprak when he starts to perform in combination with the team and the bike."