Jonathan Rea accepts that against Alvaro Bautista’s current pace on the Aruba.it Racing Ducati V4 R second place was the maxim🎀um he could target in Thailand.

The reigning World Superbike champion looked⛄ powerless to stop Bautista using the V4 R’s outright top speed and acceleration advantage to charge to another💜 hat-trick of race wins, while the pair clashed on track in race one, only to see the Spanish rider maintain his 100% winning start to the season.

Wit✨h Rea finishing every r🤡ace so far this season in second place behind Bautista, the Kawasaki rider feels he was able to get the most out of his ZX-10RR package as he plots a fightback over the start of the European part of the season.

“The best we could hop⛎e for today was a brace of second places and we managed to achieve that, albeit with a lot of pressure from Alex [Lowes] in the final race,” Rea said. “He kept really pushing, as he had in the sprint race, but I just had that little bit extra in the end of race three to go away.

“I want to thank my team for giving me a good bike this weekend and there is always some work to do to improve the package. I felt this weekend we struggled a little bit with front end stability, especially when the front was moving a litt𝓡le bit in ❀that second part of the final race, in the sectors where I was strong.

“Behind my visor I was giving it 110% especially in those early laps to try and keep in the slipstream as long as I could. As soon as I lost that it was back to managing my own race. I am taking home 49 points again and we will trℱy to build on that in E🗹urope.”

Despite losing out to Bautista, Rea is just♐ 26 points behind the Spaniard after the opening two rounds meaning one DNF coupled with the Northern Irish rider winning in a full distance race would see the pair split by just one point.