Image: Russell Colvin.

Series newcomer Scott Redding has taken top spot in the opening practice session for round one of the 2020 FIM Motul Superbike World Championship, Yamaha Finance round at Phillip Island.

On a damp track, the WorldSBK rookie set the best lap of 1m41.658s on his factory Aruba.it Racing Ducati, as the 33rd season of competition in the production championship finally got underway.

With the 13 riders on track taking a cautious approach, Leon Haslam was second fastest in FP1 on the Team HRC Honda ahead of Alex Lowes (Kawasaki Racing Team), Tom Sykes (BMW Motorrad) and world champion Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team).

Completing the top 10 this morning were American debutant Garrett Gerloff (GRT Yamaha), Alvaro Bautista (Team HRC Honda), Max Schieb (Kawasaki) and World Supersport graduate Federico Caricasulo (GRT Yamaha).

Six of this weekend’s field didn’t take to the circuit, including Chaz Davies (Aruba.it Racing Ducati) as well as Pata Yamaha pair Michael van der Mark and Toprak Razgatlioglu.

Image: Russell Colvin.

The FIM Supersport World Championship started with the first practice session from Phillip Island, starting off damp but drying throughout the session.

It was Andrea Locatelli (Bardahl Evan Bros. Yamaha) who was fastest during the session after completing just four laps.

Corentin Perolari (GMT94 Yamaha) was second quickest, almost 0.7s back from Locatelli, after being the first rider to switch to slick tyres during the session.

Teammate Jules Cluzel finished in third place with Estonian rider Hannes Soomer (Kallio Racing) in fourth place. South African rider Steven Odendaal (EAB Ten Kate Racing) rounded out the top five, with wildcard Oli Bayliss (Cube Racing Yamaha) 13th.

Detailed results