Nicky Hayden is eager to race in Thailand, having narrowly missed out on a podium finish on his WorldSBK debut weekend in Australia two weekends ago.

The Honda WorldSBK Team rider, who won the MotoGP world title in 2006, has never competed at the Chang International Circuit – host venue of this weekend’s second round of the season – but has experienced the track at somewhat lower speeds.

“I did some laps on my bicycle and the track looks nice, but it'll look different from the motorcycle!” Hayden told WorldSBK.com at the Buriram venue on Thursday. “The facility is really nice and everything is first class. I'm looking forward to doing some laps because there's a few tricky corners that I'll need to understand better.”

In Race 2 last time out at Phillip Island, Hayden was just fractions of a second away from a maiden WorldSBK rostrum result, just missing out to Davide Giugliano.

“I'm really anxious to get started and see what's going on,” the American continues. “I think that this year will really tell us a lot more about what our potential can be this weekend because Phillip Island is a little bit unique. We had special tyres (compounds for Phillip Island), two days of testing beforehand and it was a track that I know, whereas here will be show a little bit more about what I can expect in WorldSBK. It's a track that I don't know and I'll have to practice on Friday and race on the weekend.

“We learned a lot over the weekend in Phillip Island about the bike but also about my understanding of the whole championship. It was very useful and I'm not going to lie: I enjoyed being competitive and being back up there again!”

Hayden returns to action as Free Practice 1 begins in Thailand on Friday, with the session commencing at 10:15 local time (GMT +7).