Nicolo Bulega “couldn’t do more” in Toprak Razgatlioglu Portimao WorldSBK battle

Three races and three defeats to Toprak Razgatlioglu sounds like a disappointing weekend for Nicolo Bulega, but the Italian rider found positives in his losses.

The factory Ducati rider extended his championship lead over the course of the weekend from 26 points to 29, with Razgatlioglu taking up the chase from Alvaro Bautista who was second after Australia – something which can’t have hurt the second-year World Superbike rider’s mood.

Additionally, the Autodromo Internacional do Algarve is a circuit Razgatlioglu has been strong at throughout his career, so Bulega felt that finishing within 0.2 seconds of the Turkish rider in each of the three races was a reasonable performance.

"I couldn’t do more than what I did today,” Bulega said after Race 2.

“I’m happy because this is one of Toprak’s [Razgatlioglu] best tracks.

“He’s always very, very strong here in Portimao.

“To battle with him here is a good sign. It means we’re making progress. This is important for the rest of the championship.”

Bulega was also happy about the improvements made compared to the test in Portimao two weeks ago, where he had a large deficit to Razgatlioglu and where he felt he lacked a good feeling with the Panigale V4 R.

“Two weeks ago, during testing, I didn’t have a great feeling here, but we made big improvements to the bike for the race weekend.

“Ducati and my team have worked so hard and I’m happy with our progress.”