Alvaro Bautista identifies standout favourite for Australian World Superbike round

Alvaro Bautista has picked out one rider from the World Superbike field as the benchmark at Phillip Island after the first day of this week’s test there.

The test is taking place ahead of the opening round of this year’s World Superbike Championship, which gets underway this weekend (21-23 February) at the famous Australian venue, and the first day saw four Ducati riders finish inside the top five positions.

But, clear of the field by almost half-a-second was Nicolo Bulega, who won Race 1 last year, his first race in WorldSBK.

“I think one thing is the test, another thing is racing,” Bautista told WorldSBK.com after day one of this week’s final preseason test.

“But, for sure, we saw that Nicolo [Bulega] is very strong here – last year he won his first race in his first try – so I think at the moment he is difficult to beat because he’s like a step [ahead].

“Then there is a group that can fight for maybe second or for the podium.

“But it’s only one day of testing and tomorrow we have one day more; then Friday, Saturday, Sunday. So, at the moment, it’s difficult to say.”

Bautista – who, like Bulega, won on debut in Phillip Island in 2019 when he won all three races in what was the first ever weekend to include the Superpole Race – added that the Phillip Island layout is also beneficial for riders of a certain physical stature.

“For sure, it’s a very fast track and big riders are more favoured by this because they can move better the bike in high-speed corners,” he said.

“So, if you see, the first four riders are very big and they have more advantage in these kinds of tracks. But it will be interesting to see what happens from [now] to the race weekend.”

The Spaniard was nonetheless happy with his opening day of testing in Australia, which he ended fourth-fastest behind Bulega, Andrea Iannone, and Toprak Razgatlioglu; and ahead of Danilo Petrucci.

“I’m really happy with this first day in Phillip Island because I start to recover the good feeling with the bike, with the good confidence,” Bautista said.

“For sure, it’s much different from other years, but it’s a long time that I didn’t enjoy the bike as today, so I’m really happy.

“We worked just a little bit on the bike, on the setup for the race, no big changes but just all the changes we did were a step forward.

“Also I have to congratulate Pirelli because they brought two tyres – different tyres from last year [when] we had some problems. This year in the test we did a lot of laps, good performance, no problems, so I can say that today has been a very positive first day.”

Bautista clarified that not only is his feeling in Phillip Island now better than it was at last year’s test or in the first round of the 2024 season, but better compared to the final races of last season and the other tests that have taken place this winter.

“Much better than [12 months ago], but also [compared to] the last races in Jerez or in the last test, because today I start to feel that I ride the bike not the bike rides me,” he said.

“So, I start to have more confidence on the front, I can close more the bike, so basically today I enjoyed the track.”