After making a good start to the British Supersport Championship with two fourth places at Oulton Park, island resident Dean Harrison quickly changed into pure road racing mode at the North West 200 on Wednesday.

The Honda Racing UK rider was on good pace from the start of the first Superbike session, posting a best lap of the Triangle course in 4min 54.566sec.

Top of the listings was Richard Cooper at 4:51.332, followed by an impressive Paul Jordan at 4:53.940, half a second up on Harrison.

They were followed by Mike Browne, Darryl Tweed, Peter Hickman, Glenn Irwin, TT newcomer Gary McCoy, John McGuinness, Ian Hutchinson, Josh Brookes and New Zealander Mitch Rees.

Grant Thomson was 25th quickest on the Fireblade, while Mikey Evans was 47th quickest of the 64 riders on track.

Thomson had earlier been fifth best in the initial session for newcomers, led by Sean Brolly from Carl Phillips, Rob Hodson and Florian Astner. Illiam Quayle was 21st quickest.

Some of the day’s later sessions were hit by showers of rain, resulting in some interesting names at the top of the leaderboards.

Former GP rider Jeremy McWilliams, now aged 62, was second quickest between Richard Cooper and Dean Harrison, then quickest in the Supertwin/Sportbike category ahead of Paul Jordan and Alastair Seeley.

Brookes was provisionally top of the Superstock class in front of Harrison, newcomer BSB regular Storm Stacey and 54-year-old John McGuinness.

Qualifying continues on Thursday.