Sam Lowes is heading into the first race of 2021 in confident form after securing the overall fastest time in the three-day official Qatar test.

Concentrating all his efforts on his testing schedule, Lowes set his 1’58.655 best during the evening’s mid-session 20-lap race simulation, while also securing the strongest average lap time across the full 10 hours on track (thanks to Chris Pike for the analysis), proving the Marc VDS man is exactly where he needs to be in preparation for next weekend’s opening challenge.

The impressive lap on used rubber was only half a second away from the official All Time Lap Record around the Losail layout, set by Joe Roberts in last year’s Q2 session, and with only Marco Bezzecchi and Remy Gardner lapping within a tenth of the Brit’s benchmark time, it leaves the 30-year-old with a huge confidence boost heading into the 19-round title battle kicking off in just five days time.

“Today was a very good day and it’s always nice to finish fastest.” Lowes commented as the test concluded.

“It’s actually a surprise to me” he explained “because compared to my attitude in the past, where I always had to be in the front, now with this team we’re working a lot on the bigger picture and we’re just working on race pace. We worked a lot on the bike over the first two days to give me a good feeling and in the last session tonight we put our best package together and did a race simulation.

“My best lap then was in a 20 lap race-run, so this is really positive for me. It shows that we never once tried to do a time attack and we’re in a good place. I’m sure many guys also did the long run then, so will be good to compare but I feel really good. The team did a great job because the bike felt great at the time we will be racing at on Sunday, particularly with used tyres. We’ve got really good pace and in that session we just put everything together to see where we were. I think me and Bezzecchi have very similar pace and it could be fun next weekend.

“This is the first time since I’ve been with the Marc VDS team that I’ve been able to do some testing because I crashed early last year so we’ve actually had quite a busy time. We’ve done quite a lot of work and it’s been good, testing some parts that I should have probably tested last year. The main differences now is when I go to a race weekend I’ve just got a lot bigger range of stuff in my pocket that I can use if we have an issue and that’s what’s important.

“I’ve really taken the emphasis of testing now, because in the past I’d always try and be at the front, now it’s more just do the hard work and be there next weekend. I’ve been ‘testing world champ’ loads of times but it’s never got me anywhere so this time I’m not looking for that, in the end it happened but like said it was all in the race-run, which is a positive thing. I had a really good rhythm and to be honest I didn’t expect to be fastest because I didn’t do a time attack, so I’m very happy.”