Source: Supplied.

After a gloomier start to the day, the sun came out in Aragón to accompany the first WorldSBK practice session at MotorLand, with Aruba.it Racing – Ducati rider Chaz Davies taking top honours after the first hour on circuit.

The Welshman has a fantastic record at the aragonese track and is only one point shy of Marco Melandri in being the most successful WorldSBK rider at MotorLand.

Tom Sykes took the top honours back for Kawasaki Racing Team in the afternoon with weather conditions still good, and a shootout for the quickest lap saw times start to tumble dramatically and the Kawasaki rider come out on top. He is the fastest man on Friday and goes into Tissot-Superpole as a favourite for Pole Position on Saturday.

After a morning session that saw him go second quickest, Honda rider Nicky Hayden suffered a fall in the second session but escaped unharmed to end the day in P7, and it was teammate Michael van der Mark who improved yet further to end the day in P3, just in front of Ducati rider Davide Giugliano.

IodaRacing Team’s Lorenzo Savadori put in an incredible lap on his Aprilia to complete the top 5, pushing reigning Champion Jonathan Rea back to P6. Leon Camier improved to P8 to cement MV Agusta within the top ten, and home rider Xavi Fores took his Barni Racing Team Ducati to P9, just ahead of Yamaha’s Alex Lowes.

Fores’ compatriot Jordi Torres ended the day in P12 on his BMW, meaning a margin of just over a second contained a representative of every manufacturer in an incredibly competitive field for WorldSBK in 2016.

After sun in the morning, a cloudier afternoon session saw WorldSSP back on track at MotorLand Aragón in Spain, with French MV Agusta rider Jules Cluzel keeping his form from FP1 to go fastest from FIM Europe Supersport Cup (ESS) rider Axel Bassani. Cluzel’s MV Agusta teammate Lorenzo Zanetti was third quickest.

Puccetti pair Sofuoglu and Krummenacher ended the day in P7 and P8 respectively after locking out the top three in the morning, and will surely be looking for more pace for Tissot-Superpole on Saturday.

Roberto Rolfo, after a difficult weekend in Thailand, ended the day in P4 ahead of fellow Italians Alessandro Zaccone and Cristian Gamarino.

Zaccone was another ESS rider who shone on their first outing in 2016, as the new FIM Europe Supersport Cup gets underway for the season.

Honda’s title contender PJ Jacobsen ended the day in P9, and British GRT rider Gino Rea rounded out the top ten for the day on his MV Agusta, just ahead of local rider Nico Terol, who will be looking to graduate from Superpole 1 tomorrow to fight for a top grid position at his home round.

The top 10 fastest riders from Friday go directly to the Tissot-Superpole 2 session on Saturday, with the rest in Superpole 1 to do battle over the last two spots in the final qualifying session to determine Sunday’s grid for the race.