Gregorio Lavilla had expressed concerns that the nature of the Silverstone circuit would favour his rivals for the Bennetts British Superbike crown but in free practice ahead of the third round the Airwaves Ducati rider showed them a clean pair of heels as he set the pace.

The Spanish rider, who won the crown two years ago, goes into these races as the unbeaten championship leader, and though he is confident of strong points scoring performances reckons that the power delivery of the four cylinder bikes on the acceleration out of the slow corners could give them the edge.

“We will be trying for wins, there is no doubt about that, and although they are faster out of the slow corners, I can match them in other places. Last year showed that we can get results here - I took pole and finished each race in second place.

“If I cannot win, then I will be scoring strong points with high finishes, but at the moment I am not thinking about the championship, just about these races, there is a long way to go,” said Lavilla after lapping in a best time of 1m 26.158secs.

He starts at the Northamptonshire circuit with a 33 points advantage over Leon Camier who ran fifth fastest aboard the Bike Animal Honda rider who ran only half a second down. “Times were not the most important thing, rather we tried a number of things to ensure that the bike is set-up for the races.”

The 20 year old Ashford rider, a former British 125GP and Supersport Champion, is chasing his first victory in the top flight, and is confident after two hard working sessions. That is also the case for Tommy Hill, the Virgin Media Optoma Loans Yamaha rider, the pole starter of the previous round, who closed in on Lavilla, running just 0.305secs down.

Jonathan Rea headed off the challenge of his HM Plant Honda team-mate, the reigning champion and last year's double winner here, Ryuichi Kiyonari, to set third best time, but for Leon Haslam, sixth up on the leaderboard, there was a painful bruising as he tipped off at Maggotts.

Chris Walker showed the benefits of a lengthy test session last week as he set an improving seventh best time, with a lap of 1m 26.829secs aboard his Rizla Suzuki, just ahead of former champion Shane Byrne who escaped injury as he tipped off his Stobart Vent Axia Motorsport Honda.

Tom Sykes maintain his steady progress with a lap of1m 26.896secs to be ninth from Michael Rutter on the Isilon MSS Discovery Kawasaki.

Tristan Palmer, deputising for the injured Michael Howarth aboard the THR Honda, was the fastest of the British Superbike Cup riders, with a lap in 1m 28.836secs, ahead of Marty Nutt and former title winner James Buckingham who suffered abrasions in a tumble at Becketts.

The Superbike riders have one further period of free practice, 10.05-10.55 on Saturday morning with the grid deciding session 14.40-15.30. The two 20 laps races are on Sunday, starting at 12.40 and 15.20.