Image: Russell Colvin.

A 1m29.496s posted in the first free practice session by Cru Halliday saw the Yamaha Racing Team rider notch a new Mi-Bike Australian Superbike Championship (ASBK) best lap at Sydney Motorsport Park, believing that effort could be lowered with a cleaner attempt.

Halliday topped the first Superbike session this morning, improving on the previous ASBK best lap around the venue set by Josh Waters (McMartin Racing Ducati) of a 1m29.570s, posted at the pre-season test earlier this year.

“We went out there with an old tyre and we just seemed to link a couple of high 1m30s, then we got to the low 30s on an old tyre,” Halliday explained to CycleOnline.com.au. “It was moving all over the joint and I thought ‘we are going pretty quick with an old tyre’, then we threw a new tyre in and went straight to a 1m29.4, and I was like ‘yeah I didn’t expect that’.

“The good thing is, that lap wasn’t even super clean. I made a bit of a fumble going into turn six where the rear end came up a bit too high, and it sort of slapped me back and forth and ran me mid-track, but if I can clean that up, I reckon we could easily lower than again.”

Behind Halliday in this morning’s session was teammate and defending champion Mike Jones, slotting into second position with a 1m29.875s. The second Superbike practice at round two is scheduled to commence at 2:05pm local time.