Reigning world championship team Kawasaki Racing Team completed their final European winter test this week, and left Jerez de la Frontera feeling confident ahead of the much anticipated Round One at Phillip Island.

Poor weather conditions determined the pace of the test, as rain took over the Spanish circuit. But the pair were able to work on their base set-up, and smooth out any issues they have come across ahead of the final test of the pre-season.

2016 World Champion Jonathan Rea ended both days of the test on top, as the Northern Irishman secured some solid set-up options for the season ahead on top of working with some new developments from Pirelli.

“The test was really positive,” express’ Rea, “On the first day we waited for the track to dry and then we got some valuable track time. We maximised that by testing different suspension set ups, with the 2016 fork as the base, to try out some ideas. We confirmed the best chassis and suspension set up that we will start the year with and we worked with some engine components and clutches, to understand what my preference is. We practiced starts and found something that was good for me. Pirelli also brought some development tyres to try, which we gave some time to. We crossed a few things off our list and back-to-backed a few things. We were also trying to look for some performance, a bit of lap time and we did that on Wednesday. We are getting ready now for Phillip Island.”

 Team-mate Tom Sykes made the most of both dry and wet track time at Jerez, and feels that he can now head to Phillip Island with a more stable setting with his ZX-10RR. Securing the second fastest time over both days, the Yorkshireman now feels they are close to where they want to be for the next and final test in Australia.

Sykes explains: “On day one we started strongly and then very quickly moved on to try out many different test items and machine setup changes. We knew where we were with the base of the bike and we then used a lot of time on track to ensure we will arrive in Phillip Island with a lot less options to evaluate. We still have some small work to do in the Australian tests but because of what we did yesterday we were able to go through a lot of items. Today, in the wet, we built up speed, gradually made some small changes and ended up fairly close to where we needed to be. We found out a lot of information. We now have a cleaner slate to make our preparations for the first race. For Phillip Island we need to start being more focused on performance.”