Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team) had a stunning day in the searing heat of Thailand, securing pole position and the race win at a circuit which has treated the reigning champion well in the past. Launching off into the lead as the lights went out; Rea was able to dominate the field by 6.279s as he crossed the line.

Meanwhile, team-mate Tom Sykes (Kawasaki Racing Team) secured a late podium in the fast paced race, pipping retuning Italian Marco Melandri (Aruba.it Racing-Ducati) to the line following an end of race battle between the pair. Sykes also had a strong day aboard his ZX-10RR; qualifying in second position and taking third position in the race.

Rea praised his team following the strong race, as he got off to the perfect start and didn’t look back: “I felt really good and quite calm, my guys gave me a really good bike again and that was my plan. We had a really good pace but Chaz also had a very fast pace, as did Marco, so I had to ride away into T1 to make the holeshot, I wanted to get my head down in T1 and I did it. I managed to get a good gap and then built up a rhythm, I was just doing my job and it was enough to win, so I’m really happy.”

However he notes that tomorrow’s reshuffled grid structure will create for a tough afternoon: “Starting from ninth tomorrow is a big factor to be honest, I knew today was my chance to win because starting from ninth tomorrow will be much harder. Coming from the third row here is going to be tough, as it is a track that’s hard to pass at. The idea is get to the front group as fast as I can, but tomorrow is going to be difficult.

Sykes was happy to get a podium finish around Chang International Circuit this weekend: “I took an opportunity to get on the podium and it finally worked, and we are now able to get a lot of information. I had a small problem for a good part of the race with the braking system, but I think that will be fixed now. I’ll hopefully be strong on the brakes but overall it’s quite acceptable and I feel like we can bring the fight tomorrow. It was a fast pace and we’ll see what we can do for tomorrow.”

The green-shod duo will be looking to take on the heat in the final race of the MOTUL Thai Round, at 16:00 LT (+8 GMT).