Monteblanco BSB Testing Results: Jason O’Halloran denies Ryan Vickers

The British Superbike Championship fired into life for the first time in 2020 as the first of three days warm weather testing in Monteblanco, Spain kicked off with Jason O’Halloran atop the timesheets.

Riding the new generation Yamaha R1, McAMS’ O’Halloran hit the front in the closing stages of the day with a 1m 38.092secs lap, which unseated long-time front-runner Ryan Vickers on the RAF Regular & Reserves Kawasaki.

Indeed, the youngster, who confirmed his place on the 2020 BSB grid earlier this week looked set to draw first blood before he was usurped by the Australian, though he still had the measure of Josh Brookes and Christian Iddon on their respective VisionTrack Ducatis.

Danny Buchan completed the top five on the Massingberd-Mundy Kawasaki, ahead of the impressive Joe Francis, who crept up the order on the Lloyd & Jones PR BMW to out-perform his S1000RR counterparts of Rich Energy OMG duo Hector Barbera and Luke Mossey in seventh and eighth.

Tommy Bridewell (Oxford Ducati) and Dan Linfoot (Santander Salt TAG Yamaha) rounded out the top ten, ahead of McAMS Yamaha’s Tarran Mackenzie and Smiths BMW’s Peter Hickman.

The Spanish test is a chance for several teams to get some warm weather testing in the bag before April's season opener. However, the likes of Honda Racing, Buildbase Suzuki and TAS Racing have declined the invite and as such will make their first appearance at the official pre-season test at Silverstone ahead of the curtain raiser.

Monteblanco BSB Testing Results – Day 1/3