Iker Lecuona writes off Jerez WorldSBK victory chances

Cremona’s triple win feels distant already for Iker Lecuona, who has written off his victory chances at the WorldSBK Jerez finale after only one day of running in Andalusia.

Lecuona was a comfortable winner in all three of the races at Cremona in September while Nicolo Bulega took three seconds to wrap up the title. But with the title secure Bulega returned to his usual dominance at Estoril last week, winning all three races in commanding fashion.

The Italian, who won all three races at Jerez last year, brought that Estoril form to southern Spain for his final WorldSBK round before moving to MotoGP, topping both Friday practices with Lecuona over two-tenths adrift in third in both sessions.

“I struggled a lot,” Iker Lecuona admitted after FP2, speaking to WorldSBK.com.

“Today was a hard day for us in the office, was a very bad feeling on the bike overall. We tried something new in the afternoon [FP2] also, but we didn’t find a way to feel good at least. 

“It’s true in the last run I felt a bit more competitive, or at least more constant on the lap time that I’m very inconsistent this morning. This afternoon we destroyed the tyre very soon. 

“So, it’s quite tricky, but now it’s time to work, honestly. Now the team is checking all the data from this morning, this afternoon, because it’s true this afternoon it’s more hot but the feeling was very similar [to FP1] in a bad [way]. 

“So, let’s see if we can find something for tomorrow.”

As a result, Lecuona is focused on securing second place this weekend rather than pushing for more wins to see out his first season with Ducati.

“I think he [Bulega] has extra speed and it’s [winning] not my goal right now,” he said.

“I need to be honest and if I’m honest my target is to be second in front of Sam [Lowes] or Surra that they go very fast, also Montella goes always fast here. 

“That’s the goal right now and try to finish this year with those three second [places], and then let’s see if we can find the way during the winter.”