Jonathan Rea will want to ‘reclaim authority’ in 2023 at Superbike World Championship says James Toseland

James Toseland believes Jonathan Rea will want to “reclaim his authority” at the Superbike World Championship in what he thinks will be “a real treat” of a season.

The last two years have seen some stunning racing in the series, with Rea, Alvaro Bautista and Toprak Razgatlioglu fighting at the front of the field with three different teams.

Bautista won last year’s thrilling three-way battle, whilst Razgatlioglu beat Rea to the title in 2021.

“Rea will revel in that,” Toseland told Eurosport when asked about whether the Kawasaki rider will be more motivated, having not won the championship since 2020.

“To win it a seventh time is obviously something that he’d like to do. But to beat Toprak and Bautista will be more important to him, reclaiming the authority in this championship again.

“I don’t think he would be worried about getting the number one back, he loves that 65 just as much.

“What he will want to do is get it back from the two people that have taken it from him in the last two years regardless, that will definitely help the motivation.

“But Rea has never had a problem with motivation. If you’re a six-time champion, you have not got a problem with motivation because it’s the consecutive championships that really show the true character of someone.

“It doesn’t matter if they win absolutely everything in their sport. They have to do it again and you can’t teach that.”

Toseland believes the championship is in the best place it has ever been, pointing to the strength in depth of the series with the likes of Danilo Petrucci, former Moto2 champion Remy Gardner and Supersport world champion Dominique Aegerter joining the championship.

The two-time World Superbike champion Toseland is not sure if anyone can bridge the gap to the big three though, as he explained the strengths and weaknesses of the trio.

“They are very different and that’s what’s really interesting to watch for me as an ex-racer, watching how they do things on a motorcycle,” said Toseland.

“They individually do things very, very differently because their statures are quite different.

“Toprak is a 5ft 11 rider, a very similar build to Valentino Rossi. Toprak’s breaking technique – which I have never seen before on a motorcycle and he derived from his stunt bike career – has given him that skill which has transferred into his racing.

“It gives him a confidence on the front end and that kind of bike control on the front wheel, it has really changed the game on braking and is what everyone else has had to increase their skill level at.

“Rea and Kawasaki, that’s one area they really have had to work on. Jonathan as an all-round great rider – his style, his consistency, his determination and his experience are the keys.

“It’s something the other three haven’t got. So that level of consistency for a rider with the same team, that’s a massive advantage if it works and it has.”

He continued: “Then Bautista, for some reason on a V4 Ducati he is just able to extract the absolute best out of it compared to most people.

“It’s just one of those marriages. It’s like [Marc] Marquez and the Honda, Valentino and the Yamaha.

“If you look back at the 2004 title when Valentino first jumped on the Yamaha, nobody could do that.

“This is what it looks like for Bautista. His natural size and stature, and his top speed is so fast because of the combination of his engine and his actual bodyweight to weight ratio. It has real advantages in the right place with him on it.

“Where it looks like there are problems with the Ducati, it looks like Bautista doesn’t kind of encourage those issues as much as other riders do.

“Bautista and the Ducati work naturally as a marriage, the experience of the Kawasaki and Jonathan and Toprak’s game-chancing, riding ability, it’s really exciting to watch.”

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