Gradual gains for Team HRC at Most

Round eight of the 2023 Superbike World Championship is now underway at the Czech track of Most, with day one of action bringing mixed conditions for the Team HRC riders and their SBK colleagues.

Factory riders Iker Lecuona  and Xavi Vierge took to the track at 10.30am local time for the first of the free practice sessions. With rain falling as the session began, the entire SBK field made something of a cautious start but as the practice progressed, the rain stopped, and the track gradually began to dry. This meant that lap times only began to tumble in the final stages of this first phase, with Vierge propelling himself into eighth position after setting a fastest time of 1’36.239 in the last few seconds. Team-mate Lecuona had a little more trouble finding the right feeling with the track during FP1. The Spaniard spent time in the pits making adjustments to the set-up of his CBR1000RR-R, completing only seven laps during the course of the 45-minute session. Iker placed twenty-second at the session’s end, having been unable to make use of the dry conditions in the final stages.

The Team HRC duo benefitted from fully dry conditions for the afternoon’s second practice. This meant that both were immediately able to improve on their best times of the morning, before gradually lowering their references exit after exit. Lecuona took a significant step in the latter stages, setting a 1’33.108 in the final five minutes of the session after three of his previous fast lap attempts were invalidated by a yellow flag. Despite Iker’s time being just over seven tenths from the top, the Spaniard positioned thirteenth in the day’s extremely close combined standings, followed by team-mate Vierge, just three tenths away in sixteenth place, with a time of 1’33.401. With the top seventeen riders all closing within a second of each other, the racing promises to be as close fought as ever this weekend.

Lecuona and Vierge will be back at it tomorrow, competing in the final free practice before focusing on Superpole and the first of the weekend’s three races.

Note to editors: view this email in your browser to see more images in the coming hours

Full Results  *Courtesy of WorldSBK.com