WorldSBK Magny-Cours, France - Free Practice Results (3)

Scott Redding set a blistering pace at the end of WorldSBK FP3 at Magny-Cours to take top spot from Toprak Razgatlioglu. 

Alex Lowes was the rider with the early pace before team-mate Jonathan Rea went quickest with the best lap of the weekend. 

But with nine minutes remaining, championship leader Razgatlioglu moved to the top with a first sub 1m 37s lap. 

The Yamaha rider then improved his lap again by just under a tenth - put him four tenths clear of Rea in second. 

Rea did manage to reduce Razgatlioglu’s advantage to just over a tenth, before Redding set a stunning 1:36.393s - nearly three tenths faster than Razgatlioglu. 

There was a bizarre incident between GRT Yamaha riders Garrett Gerloff and Kohta Nozane as their bikes were lying on-track together. Both riders were ok and remounted before heading down pit lane.

Not for the first time this year, Michael Van Der Mark was reduced to watching the action from his pit box following issues with his M 1000 RR machine. 

Free Practice Two

World Superbike championship leader Toprak Razgatlioglu dominated FP2 at Magny-Cours. 

After a slight delay to FP2 because of track conditions being affected in the WorldSSP300 session, it was Chaz Davies who set the pace. 

The GoEleven Ducati rider built on his impressive final ten minutes of FP1 in which he finished sixth, while MIchael Van Der Mark did the same in third. Separating the Ducati and BMW riders early on was Kawasaki’s Alex Lowes.  

The front three remained the same for over half the session before Razgatlioglu went to the top by just under two tenths. 

Razgatlioglu's top time began a consistent run of laps that all would have been good enough for the top three, before further improving his time by 0.011s. 

After Tom Sykes momentarily went second fastest, Davies then regained second with a lap just 0.014s slower than the Yamaha rider, while Scott Redding moved up to sixth - on spot behind Jonathan Rea. 

Koha Nozane suffered a crash late on while Van Der Mark encountered a mechanical issue aboard his BMW M 1000 RR. 

Razgatlioglu reinforced his advantage at the top once the time attacks started, while Rea went second - three tenths slower than his main title rival. Redding then split the pair with his final lap to finish second overall.

Free Practice One

Jonathan Rea topped the opening WorldSBK practice session at Magny-Cours ahead of Michael Van Der Mark and Alex Lowes. 

While a mostly dry weekend at Magny-Cours has been forecasted, riders chose to stay in pit lane early on as overnight rain dampened the track surface. 

Three of those riders included championship contenders Toprak Razgatlioglu, Rea and Scott Redding. 

Kohta Nozane was one of the first to venture out alongside Barni Ducati rider Tito Rabat. 

Short of running at the French circuit in recent seasons, Honda pairing Alvaro Bautista and Leon Haslam were others to test out the conditions. 

After setting the fastest lap of the four runners, Bautista returned to pit lane along with Nozane, while team-mate Haslam and Rabat continued on. 

It wasn’t until 20 minutes to go until that the action began to pick up courtesy of Andrea Locatelli. The Italian was soon followed by championship leader Razgatlioglu and Aruba.it Ducati duo Redding and Michael Rinaldi. 

With under ten minutes to go every rider was out on track and setting personal best lap times through to the checkered flag. 

Redding was the man at the top for most of it, before being bettered by Razgatlioglu, Lowes, Van Der Mark and Rea in the final minute.