Source: HRC.

Double MotoGP World Champion Casey Stoner will make a rare public appearance on board a factory Repsol Honda at the Top Gear Festival on 18-19 April, set to smash the Sydney Motorsport Park GP Circuit lap record.

Stoner, who currently serves as a Honda Racing Corporation test rider after retiring in 2012, has been confirmed by the event organisers for the 2015 running next month to ride a current-spec RC213V.

A previous appearance was made by Stoner at Sydney’s inaugural Top Gear Festival in 2013, where he rode a Team Honda Racing-prepared CBR1000RR superbike in a staged battle against Red Bull duo Mark Webber (Formula One) and Jamie Whincup (V8 Supercars).

The current Australian Superbike qualifying lap record is held by Robert Bugden at 1m29.842s, set in 2013 riding for Team Suzuki on a GSX-R1000. The Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix was last held at Eastern Creek in 1996, with Alex Criville’s lap record standing at 1m30.359s on a Repsol Honda NSR500.

In 2013 and 2014, Red Bull Racing had a Formula One car in action at Sydney’s Top Gear Festival, with current F1 front-runner Daniel Ricciardo last year setting a new unofficial outright circuit best of 1m11.233s to beat Webber’s previous 1m13.606s benchmark.