Sam Lowes ended Friday with the second fastest time after two quick and consistent sessions that opened the French World Superbike round. 

Lowes had an excellent opening to the weekend, placing second in FP1 before grabbing the third fastest time in FP2.

Lowes is eyeing some minor adjustments to his settings ahead of Superpole on Saturday at 11:15 local time and Race 1, which starts at 15:30.

/// SAM LOWES: 2nd, 1’36.131, 42 laps 

After a seven-week summer break, the Elf Marc VDS Racing Team were back in action at the tight, technical Magny-Cours Circuit on Friday, when conditions were dry and sunny throughout.

Lowes was quickly in the groove in FP1 with his personal best time of 1’35.840 good enough for second place, just 0.284s back of championship leader Nicolo Bulega.

Feeling largely at home aboard the Elf Marc VDS Racing Team Ducati Panigale V4R, the Briton showed excellent consistency over an 18-lap run in FP2.

The 35-year old’s best lap of the afternoon came ten laps into that run, which suggests Lowes had even more up his sleeve for a single flying lap. His 1’36.131 put him third, 0.2s back of Bulega.

Lowes was the quickest name through the track’s first sector and is aiming to make small improvements to his feeling in Sectors Two and Four ahead of Saturday.

“We did some nice work this afternoon on the race pace”

“That was a good first day. 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.”