Rea already in talks for 2016 Suzuka Eight-Hours

World Superbike series leader Jonathan Rea will miss this year’s Suzuka Eight-Hours, a race he has won twice in the past, as he wants to focus solely on lifting his first ever world title - but the Kawasaki man has revealed he has had talks for next year’s event.

Rea took victory with the FCC TSR team alongside Ryuichi Kiyonari - who rides for Team Kagayama this year - but switched to the works Kawasaki squad for WSBK in 2015. His season has gone so well that the Castletown resident didn’t want to break his rhythm.

“It was tempting, but I didn’t want to break the rhythm I had with the Superbike and I had the full support of KHI after I explained my situation but Suzuka is something I want to do again. Hopefully we can achieve our target in WSBK this year, we’re really on course but I think we can start thinking once we’ve ticked the boxes that we want to achieve this year then we can set our targets for next season,” said Rea, speaking to bikesportnews.com.

“When I signed for Kawasaki at the start of the year I only had one main target and whilst we’re on course for that I don’t want to take my eye off the ball. It was really nice to be asked to do Suzuka, and deep down in my heart it will be an event that I’ll miss because it will be the highlight of my career – I think it’s one of the best wins you can have winning it with a team-mate because so much more goes into the race than just an individual race like World Superbikes.

“It’s just not the right timing for me this year but I spoke to them there just last week, KHI, and we’ve been discussing the factory plan for 2016.”

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