Chaz Davies is happy with his progress after ending the first of three pre-season tests for the new World Superbikes season.

The Powys-born rider clocked a best time of one minute 40.324 secs on the second day at Jerez in Spain on Wednesday.

Davies was returning to his Ducati Panigale bike after two months off to begin preparations for next month’s season opener in Australia.

The 29-year-old said: “All in all, this first test has been OK.

“It’s always a bit tiring from a physical standpoint because we step on the bike for the first time in two months, but we progressively got into the swing of things.

“Also, Ducati brought a lot of stuff and we ticked off the most important items on the list, but we still got work to do in Portimao.

“We got progressively quicker, even mixing things up a bit in terms of our setup.

“That’s what testing is about, working through a program slowly but surely to step up to new challenges.

“If I had to race tomorrow, we would probably stick to a more familiar setting, but we’ll focus on pushing the boundaries before heading to Australia.”

Davies’ time left him fifth on the time-sheets just behind new team-mate Marco Melandri.

Reigning champ Jonathan Rea posted the quickest time on his Kawasaki for the second day in a row, finishing half-a-second quicker than Davies.

Ducati will test in Portugal this weekend before heading to Australia for a final test ahead of the first race.

Davies won seven of the last eight races last season – including the final six – to finish third in the standings behind Rea and Tom Sykes.