The opening day of the 2025 British Superbike Championship saw Leon Haslam go fastest at Oulton Park.

Leon Haslam returned to the top of the Bennetts British Superbike timesheets at Oulton Park to kickstart his 2025 season.

The 2018 British Superbike Champion was 0.041 seconds clear of second place on his Ducati return.

After two seasons on a BMW that Haslam ran from his own ROKiT Haslam squad, the 41-year-old switched to the Ducati Panigale V4 R and Moto Rapido Racing for 2025.

Despite the Ducati being a competitive bike, Haslam understandably had doubts ahead of the new season. But after the opening day at Oulton Park, he has answered his own doubts.

On Saturday at Oulton Park, Haslam said: “I feel really positive, we had a good test here and with everything we learned at the test, we’ve made the bike a little bit better again and have been P1 in both sessions.

“We’ve actually only been concentrating on the race runs and tried to put some long laps together to understand this new tyre. So it is so far so good, and we’ll see what tomorrow brings.

“Obviously, I’ve been wanting to get on the Ducati for a long time, it’s been a very competitive bike, and there’s always that doubt in your mind of whether it will suit my style.

“Is it as good as what I think, and it’s better than what I remember? It’s amazing!

“The team have done a fantastic job, but we’ve just got to stay calm and take it step by step.

“There’s a lot of fast guys with fast pace so at the minute we’re doing a really good job, we’re understanding the bike and the tyres and we just need to put it together for the rest of the weekend.”

Haslam was the fastest rider on Day One, but the top 12 riders, who all automatically made it into Q2, were only separated by 0.808 seconds.