Alex Lowes tops first day of practice for 2024 WorldSBK at Phillip Island

Alex Lowes emerged as the fastest rider at the end of the first day of competition in the opening round of the 2024 WorldSBK Championship at Phillip Island.

Kawasaki’s Alex Lowes outperformed his more fancied rivals on a rather extraordinary timesheet during the second free practice of the 2024 WorldSBK Championship at Phillip Island.

The day’s heavy winds and sporadic drizzle dampened some of the more extreme predictions regarding lap times on the recently resurfaced Australian circuit after the pit-lane opened at 1600 on Friday afternoon for the 45-minute World Superbike FP2 session amid sporadic showers at Phillip Island.

For the first ten minutes, the majority of the field remained in their pit-box. However shortly after they finally got down to business, a red flag interruption ensued after Cape Barren Geese invaded the track.

Lowes was still able to set a new lap record with a time of 1m 29.042s, besting the mark set by Andrea Locatelli during FP1 although it fell short of the 1m 28secs laps set during testing earlier in the week in hotter conditions.

Lowes’ placement at the top of the timesheets, whatever of the actual times, was further proof of the impressive pace he showcased on Tuesday and during the first practice session. The British rider was in excellent form around the circuit where he secured his only victory as a Kawasaki rider back in 2020.

The reigning trinity of recent seasons Alvaro Bautista, Toprak Razgatlioglu and Jonathan Rea seemed to struggle in the unpredictable conditions during the first day of practice and it was up to some unfamiliar faces to hold onto the lead going into Saturday’s Superpole and opening race.

Rookie Nicolo Bulega overcame the challenging weather to secure the second spot, barely than a tenth of a second behind Lowes . Locatelli, on the other hand, owed his third place on the overall leaderboard to his session-topping FP1 effort despite only finishing 11th in FP2.

Danilo Petrucci made an outstanding breakthrough by setting the fourth fastest time while Michael van der Mark emerged from Razgatlioglu’s shadow on his ROKiT BMW to round out the top five. in FP2.

Sam Lowes had a terrifying moment in FP2 after suffering a high side heading into Turn 2 and ended up sliding through the soggy grass and gravel. Despite this setback, he continued his strong start to the year with the sixth quickest time, having shadowed his brother Alex with a third-place finish in FP1.

Go Eleven’s Andrea Iannone and Motocorsa’s Michael Ruben Rinaldi wrapped up the quartet of satellite Ducati riders within the top eight as Remy Gardner and an oddly out of balance Toprak Razgatlioglu rounded out the top 10.

Nevertheless, he fared much better compared to a frustrated Bautista as the reigning champion was spotted shaking his head quite often because he couldn’t get into the rhythm on the Aruba.Ducati as he finished down in 12th place.

In a similar vein, Jonathan Rea struggled to find his rhythm on the Pata PROMETEON Yamaha and ended up only finishing 16th place after missing a significant chunk of FP2.

Other than the Lowes brothers, it was a tough first day for the British contingent, as Scott Redding finished in 18th place after his BMW’s technical problems ended his run 15 minutes into the practice.

2024 WorldSBK Phillip Island Free Practice 2 Results