Alex Lowes (Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK) had mixed emotions after Race 2 in the MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship at the Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours, declaring it a ‘fun’ race after he fought back from 19th on Lap 1 to finish in fourth. The #22 had shown strong pace all weekend and that was the case even as he carved his way through the field to claim an unlikely top-four finish to conclude his Motul French Round.
Lowes started the 21-lap race from second on the grid and he slotted in behind Nicolo Bulega (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati) on the opening lap, before he pulled off the track at the Turn 8, 180-degree hairpin and looked down to the left side of his ZX-10RR machine. He was able to re-join the race but had dropped all the way down to 19th and, even with 20 full laps to go, looked to be out of contention for a top-five finish. He eventually finished 6.567s down on race winner Bulega and just over two seconds away from Garrett Gerloff (Bonovo Action BMW) in third as he secured P4.
Discussing what happened on the first lap, Lowes said: “It was a disappointing first lap. I made a good start, I was behind Bulega and felt like I had the pace to challenge. Obviously, unfortunate with Toprak and Alvaro being injured. Firstly, I wish them all the best to be back as soon as possible but with those two injured, it opened the race up a little bit. I felt strong. On the first lap, I had an issue with the bike; we have to analyse it and see what it was. I thought it was going to end the race, so I pulled directly off the track, as I didn’t want to be in the way of the other guys, reset some buttons a bit and got going. I was convincing myself it wasn’t right for a few laps but then I got my head down and felt quite strong. It was disappointing. It’s so close in WorldSBK now, you can’t be starting last on the first lap and expect to be doing too much, but it was a fun race.”
Despite losing so much time on Lap 1 – he lost five seconds in Sector 3, which starts just where he pulled off the circuit, when comparing the times from Lap 1 and Lap 2 – he was able to fight his way back to P4. By the end of Lap 2, the Kawasaki rider was into 14th, and he reached the top ten by the end of Lap 8. Progress became a bit slower by this point, but he got ahead of Andrea Locatelli (Pata Prometeon Yamaha) for ninth at Turn 5, where he made so many of his passes, before Scott Redding (Bonovo Action BMW) and Remy Gardner (GYTR GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team) followed in the next couple of laps. After he got ahead of Xavi Vierge (Team HRC) on Lap 13, he took advantage of Iker Lecuona (Team HRC) running wide to move into fifth before his final pass on Michael van der Mark (ROKiT BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team) came at Turn 13 on Lap 18.
Explaining his fight through the field, while also lamenting his issue on Lap 1, Lowes stated: “If I take all the expectation out of it, the race was great because I enjoyed it, passed a lot of guys. In the last couple of laps, I used up a lot of tyre trying to turn the bike more to pass some of the other riders. It shows how good the Kawasaki’s working at the minute to be able to pass so many guys. I feel like I’m able to ride the bike on the limit and really put the bike where I want. The general disappointment is I had the chance to win, and we probably had the speed to win; not taking anything away from Nicolo because we weren’t there so we don’t know, but certainly we had the chance to fight for the podium and fight for victory. We need to look as a team, analyse why we didn’t do that but also be positive that we’re fast enough to have the opportunity to do it. Overall, it’s been positive. A second and fourth place on Sunday, it felt like we maybe could’ve done a bit more but the speed’s there, confidence is there, and we have a few rounds coming up in quick succession.”
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Source: WorldSBK.com