Hot Conditions At Home See Low...

Alex Lowes secured a third place ranking in the combined Free Practice timesheets after the opening day at his home round at Donington Park. His team-mate Axel Bassani found some misfortune in FP2 and finished his opening day in the UK in 16th place overall.

The bimota KB998 Rimini and official BbKRT riders Lowes and Bassani had their first experiences of the 4.023km long Donington Park circuit on Friday 11 July, in what were hot weather conditions from start to finish. Air temperatures rose to an eventual maximum of 30°C, with track temperatures reaching 43°C.

Despite having no pre-race track time at the classically sculpted Donington Park layout Lowes was on strong form from the start, leading all comers in FP1 on the WorldSBK spec KB998 Rimini machine.

Lowes did not go out with the aim to set another fast single lap time in the second free practice session, as he preferred to make a near full race simulation in the same kind of hot conditions that should grace Race One on Saturday afternoon.

Bassani ended up having a complicated Friday at Donington after finishing FP1 in 17th place - although just over a second behind the fastest lap time.

Axel was even closer to the eventual quickest rider in the combined times after FP2, as ended up 16th overall despite an early fall in the second session.

Saturday 12 July will host a final FP3 session, then Superpole Qualifying and finally a 23-lap Race One, which is scheduled to start at 15.00 local time in the UK.

Alex Lowes stated: “I felt good on the bike right away this morning. In the hotter conditions of the afternoon we were a bit less competitive, but still not too bad. I did quite a long run in the afternoon, to give the guys in the garage as much information as I could. I think I did 19 laps which is not too far off race distance. Today’s FP2 session was held at the start time of Race One on Saturday, and we need that kind of information in the first year we have been here on the bimota. I enjoyed it today and the bike was good fun to ride.”

Axel Bassani stated: “FP1 was quite good and we did some laps to get to know the circuit again. In FP2 we went try some tyre options but even although I was not really pushing, I lost the front. It was quite strange and I do now know why I crashed. But this is part of the game sometimes. We were not able to repair the bike so we were not able to go out again in FP2. We have a lot of work to do, but we will never give up and we will try our best.”