Alex Lowes felt good “immediately” with Bimota at Czech WorldSBK

Bimota WorldSBK rider Alex Lowes says he had a good feeling “immediately” with his KB998 in practice at this weekend’s Czech Round.

Lowes was able to show competitive pace during the afternoon World Superbike practice at Most, but he had been able to pick up a positive feeling from the Bimota already in FP1, despite four red flag stoppages and the session beginning in damp conditions.

“Immediately, I managed to feel quite good,” Lowes told WorldSBK.com. “The track was a bit damp, but I went down to decent pace and the bike was working pretty well.”

In the afternoon, Lowes worked with only one set of tyres to understand his race pace, but was third-fastest regardless.

“In the afternoon, we tried something on the bike, and it was pretty good and positive,” he said.

“I kept the same tyres all session to understand my pace.

“At the end of the first exit, my pace was strong, and I was doing my best lap after 10 laps. It looks like, after that, we had a bit of a drop with the tyre.

“There wasn’t so much rubber on the track today, and it was quite cold and windy.

“The track should improve. We need to keep an eye on that tomorrow; it’s a long race and tyre life can be a problem because temperatures are a lot cooler than we’ve had in the past.”

Despite the degradation issues past lap 10, Lowes was positive about his feeling on the bike.

“The bike itself was good fun to ride,” he said. “In sectors two and three, I think the bike was working really well. I enjoyed it.

“In the last sector, I’m not very good. Axel [Bassani] was stronger than me there so he’s doing something a bit better, so I need to try to understand that tonight.

“If I can improve there a little bit, I think we can be in a decent position to get our best results of the year. I enjoyed it and got plenty of laps in, in quite tricky conditions.”