A sensational podium to cap what would have been a super Saturday evades Sam Lowes and the Elf Marc VDS Team Racing on a dramatic day at the new Balaton Park Circuit in Hungary

Lowes was running in a strong second behind reigning WorldSBK Champion Toprak Razgatlioglu when his hopes of a maiden feature race podium in Race 1 were ended by a technical issue which saw an unfortunate crash on lap seven of 20.

Lowes is now determined to use today’s frustration as a big motivation to rebound tomorrow in the Superpole race at 11am local time ahead of Race 2 at 2pm.

^{// SAM LOWES: Superpole: 2nd, Race 1: DNF}

Having set the fastest time on Friday after immediately bonding with the tight and twisty Balaton Park Circuit, Lowes continued his sparkling form today when a lap of 1:38.747 was the best time in this morning’s FP3 action.

With temperatures close to 30 degrees ahead of Superpole, Lowes delivered another brilliant performance and a flying lap of 1:38.834 secured the Briton a fourth front row start of 2025 in second.

Race 1 commenced with Razgatlioglu immediately streaking away at the front, with Lowes involved in a thrilling fight for second spot with Andrea Locatelli.

Lowes attacked and claimed second on lap five and quickly gapped Locatelli by over half-a-second as he looked to make a decisive break away from the Italian.

The 34-year-old’s hopes of adding to top three finishes in the Superpole clashes at Assen and Donington Park earlier this season were ended when an issue with his Ducati Panigale V4R resulted in a fall at turn two on lap seven.

“We’ll go again tomorrow and hope for a more positive day.”

“That was a very disappointing way for Race 1 to end after a strong start today in Superpole and good pace all weekend. The team and I analysed the data to try and understand what happened in the crash because I honestly didn’t know the reason for it, my feeling was really good until then. We discovered that the cause was a technical issue, which unfortunately means no points today. We’ll go again tomorrow and hope for a more positive day.”