#FrenchWorldSBK Friday Debriefs

Posted September 5, 2026

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World Superbikes returned from the summer break with Nicolò Bulega reasserting his authority by topping the opening day of action at Magny-Cours as the WorldSBK Paddock arrived in France for the ninth round of the 2026 season.

Aruba.it Racing – Ducati’s Nicolò Bulega. Credit: WorldSBK

The Aruba.it Racing – Ducati rider, who has won all but one of the 24 races so far this season, ended Friday fastest overall as he took advantage of the cooler track conditions in FP1 to set the fastest time of the day, stopping the clocks at 1’35’556s despite losing time on track early on due to a technical issue.

Despite being the fastest, Bulega admitted that he still felt there was work to do to find the feeling: “I don’t have a very good feeling with my bike.  I’m fighting a little bit. I’m riding too much physically. I have to use too much strength on the bike.  I would like to be able to ride the bike more with technique and be more smooth. Now, I’ve struggled a little bit, especially in the chicanes.”

Aruba.it Racing – Ducati’s Iker Lecuona. Credit: WorldSBK

His teammate Iker Lecuona also made a strong start to the weekend, ending the combined classification in third. The Spaniard set his best time of 1’35’989s in the cooler morning session before a crash in FP2 interrupted his afternoon running and forced the team to abandon some of its planned set-up work. Despite the disruption, Lecuona was able to return to the circuit without serious consequences, while the team worked to repair his bike and get him back on track: “I need to say thanks to the team. They did a really good job, very fast to I’m very quick to repair the bike, and even like that we lose a lot of time, but we have enough time to still working on the bike. was good, and yeah, thanks to the team.”

Looking further ahead, Lecuona also made his ambitions clear after joining the Aruba.it Racing – Ducati project, revealing that his target for next season is nothing short of the WorldSBK title: “I arrive to the team with no expectation, and wanting second championship, for sure, if Nicolò leave, or even if he don’t leave, the target next year is the championship.”

ELF Marc VDS Racing Team’s Sam Lowes. Credits: WorldSBK

ELF Marc VDS Racing Team’s Sam Lowes split the two riders, while Pata Maxus Yamaha’s Xavi Vierge was the leading Yamaha in fourth after setting a strong lap late in FP1. With track temperatures reaching around 45°C in the afternoon, improvements were difficult to come by as teams instead focused on long runs and race preparation. Vierge finished ahead of Barni Spark Racing Team’s Yari Montella and Team Goeleven’s Lorenzo Baldassarri, with Ducati occupying six of the top seven positions.

Sam Lowes was encouraged by the progress made across Friday, particularly during the afternoon race-pace work, although he identified further areas to improve ahead of Saturday: “It was nice to get back on track after such a long summer break. I’ve improved in some areas. I need to improve my consistency in some parts of the track, especially Sector Four, as I wasn’t fully comfortable there. Also, I feel there’s more I can do to be faster in Sector Two. We’ll work on these things this evening and see if we can make a few tweaks for tomorrow. Overall, it’s been a good day. We did some nice work this afternoon on the race pace. Hopefully that should pay off tomorrow. Let’s keep working hard. I’m really happy to be back. And I’d like to thank the team for a good job today.

bimota by Kawasaki Racing Team’s Alex Lowes focused on race pace during the afternoon, completing 41 laps on his long run. The British rider, who scored a hat-trick of podium finishes at last year’s French Round, ended Friday tenth fastest.

There were several incidents across the day, with Motoxracing WorldSBK Team’s Bahattin Sofuoğlu crashing twice at Turn 2 and subsequently ruled out for the remainder of the weekend after sustaining a concussion. Honda HRC’s Somkiat Chantra also crashed at Turn 3, while Andrea Locatelli’s running was limited by technical issues affecting the Pata Maxus Yamaha squad.

With Bulega leading the way but still searching for a stronger feeling from his Ducati, the championship leader will look to make further progress in FP3 before Superpole and the opening race of the French Round.