With the faint sound of Christmas bells still ringing in my ears it has been right back into work for the start of WorldSBK. The first race is at the end of this month and the teams were only able to test from the middle of January, resulting in a scramble to complete the final sessions, prepare race liveries and get everything packed ready to go to Australia.

I reckon the season ahead is shaping up to be an interesting one with the introduction of new riders, teams and bikes.

It was announced at the end of last year that former MotoGP World Champion Nicky Hayden would be joining the Ten Kate Honda team, replacing Sylvain Guintoli who had moved to the Crescent team, who themselves had changed from running Suzuki to Yamaha machines. Hayden’s first appearance on the CBR1000RR at Motorland Aragon in November brought a flurry of media interest but by the next test in Jerez a few weeks later it had somewhat waned. This was in part due to the fact that, despite having the all-new 2016 Ninja ZX-10R, it was business as usual for the Kawasaki pairing of Sykes and Rea.

Hayden himself lamented the fact that his lap times at the Jerez test would have been good enough for pole position during the previous months race weekend. However, the mean green machines had blitzed the Superbike records and gone almost a second quicker. The only rider capable of staying in the wake was Chaz Davies on the Ducati.

Interestingly Davies appears to be a pre-season favourite for the Championship this year. A lot of the media and people in the paddock are looking at his end of 2015 season form and extrapolating that onto the 2016 calendar.

Personally I can’t see past Kawasaki – and not because they are one of my clients – but it seems that the new 2016 model of the ZX-10R has moved the performance of the 1000cc sport bike on a notch. Tom Sykes has most definitely found his mojo again and was posting blistering lap times at Jerez and Aragon in the last couple of weeks.

Having said that we will find out all too soon where the betting money should be going with the first race in Phillip Island only a few weeks away.

Off the track the biggest talking point is the change to the format of the race weekend. The Superbike series has always championed itself on having two races on a Sunday, offering great value for race fans. Since Dorna took over the reigns from the various iterations of Flammini Inc., they have been tinkering with the schedule. This year sees the most dramatic change with one race on a Saturday and one on a Sunday. The fans will still get two races but spread over two days. It hasn’t been received very well. The general feeling is that many people will find it too expensive to attend both days and others will feel that having only one race on Sunday takes away that unique value for money that the series was so proud of.

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