Jonathan Rea: Consistent top fives have to be Yamaha World Superbike team’s goal now
Six-time world champion urges consist♑ent t🐭op five pace from Yamaha
Yamaha’s Jonat𒈔han Rea insists “regularly we need to be in the top five now” in the second half of the 2024 Worꦑld Superbike season.
The six-time WSBK champion’s first campaign on the R1 after switching from Kawasaki has prov🉐en to be difficult, with the Ulsterman so far scoring just one podium🅠 - a third at Donington.
Having failed to score in the first five races of the 2024 campaign, recent rounds have shown signs of improvement for the Yamaha rider - t𝓀hou🦋gh he hasn’t cracked the top five since his sprint race podium at the UK event.
Looking ahead of this weekend’s Portimao round, Rea told WorldSBK.com: “Portimao’s a happy hunting♈ ground for me, it’s a track I’ve ﷺhad a lot of success at in the past.
“It means nothing sometimes when you change teams. The Yamaܫha’s a different beast around here. It has a lot of positives but☂ also some areas where we need to work on.
“The test was goodꦓ because we identified those areas and🔯 hopefully, we can work on them.
“The bike’s changed since we tested here. We’ve homed in on more of a set-up. It’♔s a different vibe with the evening race.
“It’s a track that always brings a lot of travelling suppo𓆉rt from Northern Ireland as wel𒁏l.
“The key for my weekends this season has been tryinꦑ🐈g to qualify well and we’ll put a lot of emphasis on that throughout tomorrow and Saturday morning.
“Hopefully we can qualify on those first few rows and꧒ make the races a little bit more straight forward.
“It’s a physical track but the rider can find that last little bit and I know a bit around here so𒈔 hopefully I can put it to good use.🍬 I’ve always been saying the aim is to, step by step, improve the feeling.
“ T🐻hat’s sti🐠ll the case. I want to battle inside the top five.
“That’s the next step, to try to be there. I 👍felt I had the pace to do that at Most actually, and at Donington I had a st𒆙rong weekend. Regularly we need to be in the top five now. That’s the goal.”
Rea is 10th in the standings ahead of the Portimao round on 75 points, which is 70 shy of fifth-placedꦉ team-mate Andrea Locatelli.
