Image: Russell Colvin.

Superbike World Championship (WorldSBK) debutant Remy Gardner continued his positive adaptation to the GYTR GRT Yamaha R1 at the Phillip Island test this week, finishing P9 overall and revealing ‘we didn’t try to do a flying lap’.

With a heavy focus on race pace and performance, Gardner completed 147 laps across the two days and ultimately was ninth quickest in the overall standings, his best time of a 1m31.073s eight-tenths from Alvaro Bautista’s benchmark.

“We’re satisfied with the progress we made. I enjoyed myself at Phillip Island,” Gardner explained. “Even though we didn’t try to do a flying lap, our race pace was not too bad, and the feeling was okay. I cannot wait to begin the championship, we’ll keep working during these days to progress further, we have good data available to us, so there’s still margin for improvement.”

Notably, the number 87 featured inside the top three for a majority of Tuesday afternoon’s practice in warmer and windier conditions, as the attention is now firmly focused on the opening round of the championship this weekend at the iconic 4.445km circuit.