Kyle Ride, who is more than half a second away from his rival pace and former teammate Bradley Ray, translated it into a five-second gap in the opening British Superbike race at Snettan in qualifying with his fellow Yamaha Riders.
OMG’s nitrogen competition riders are practical and chose to focus on profits in 2022 with Ray’s triple winner, Ryde said.
“I’m very pleased with the way I rode in the race, qualifying, yesterday. Brad is very good around this track. He won a lot of races here. I was able to fill the gap from what I was used to – he spent his time on electric laps in the race, but overall I think it was only a tenth of the way at the pace, but I didn’t stay in the limit.”
With a victory unlikely, the reality champion turned his attention to keeping his back to form Tommy Bridewell behind, drawing out a similar gap of himself above the Honda Rider, adding:
“So I just put Tommy behind me. It was difficult – that was the last five laps I think, Tommy must have had the fourth gap, so he succumbed to me too and slowed down a bit as I was melting!
The first 12 laps were certainly a very fast race – I don’t think you could go faster than that – I mean, at that point, I think Brad was probably 4-5 seconds in front of me.
Unlike those who found adapting to 2025 tires difficult, Ryde believes today that the compounds have allowed them to maintain a very high pace on the front despite the hot and aired state of Norfolk trucks.
“I think the tires helped with that — we’re qualifying in every race we did. I mean I did .471 in qualifying and .471 in the race.
Ride concluded his post-race interview by paying attention to a short sprint race to begin Sunday’s race action. “Long talk, I’m so happy. Try something for tomorrow. 12 laps might be a little easier.