A positive day one for Bautista in Catalunya, Haslam focuses on setup

The sixth round of the 2020 Superbike World Championship is now underway at the Barcelona-Catalunya track in Spain. Despite the unstable weather conditions, with heavy rain in the early afternoon, it proved to be a promising opening day for Team HRC and Spanish rider Alvaro Bautista, who placed fourth at the end of the first practice session.

This morning saw the Superbike field take to the Barcelona track for the first of three free practices. During this opening session, riders Alvaro Bautista and Leon Haslam started work to adapt their CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP machines to what is a brand-new circuit for the WorldSBK championship. Using data collected during their earlier post-lockdown test sessions, the pair worked hard with their technicians, Haslam particularly spending more time in the garage. By the end of the first 50-minute session, Bautista had set a best of 1’42.513, placing fourth after having led the way for most of the session. Having completed very few flying laps, Haslam recorded a 1’44.315 which saw him position eighteenth.

The second session was of little use in terms of lap times, heavy rainfall prior to the practice meaning that the session ran on a wet track. Both Bautista and Haslam found some good feeling with their bikes in a rain configuration, Alvaro concluding the wet practice session in a close fourth place again, but of course it was the times recorded during FP1 that prevailed at the end of day one, with Bautista and Haslam closing fourth and eighteenth respectively.