The checkered flag fell for them for the first time this year. IDM Superbike riders Jonas Folger and Marc Moser competed as guest riders in the French championship. The dress rehearsal ahead of the IDM season opener in two weeks went well. Folger finished third twice at Magny-Cours, and Moser placed in the top ten of the Superbike standings in both races.
The Bonovo Action team, powered by MGM, viewed the participation of the two Yamaha riders as a test. Superbike rookie Folger secured second place on the grid right away in practice with a fastest lap time of 1:38.927 minutes. He led the field in both races before engaging in a 16-lap battle with his French rivals Valentin Debise (Kawasaki), who won both races, and runner-up Mathieu Gines (Yamaha). These were no strangers to the track. Debise has been racing in Grand Prix events for years. Gines finished third overall in the 2016 IDM Superbike 1000 and was the French Endurance Champion last year. The strong local riders ultimately pulled away.
It’s remarkable that Superbike rookie Folger, who was wearing the number “4” this time, made it onto the podium twice on a track that was new to him. “The difference from the IDM was the different tire manufacturers. And the other riders had already been able to test here for several days. In contrast, because of the new asphalt, we were still having trouble tuning the suspension to the right tires. You could see it in the races: at the start, I was always up front and even briefly in the lead. Around the halfway point, it became harder to keep up with the others’ pace. We still need to work on that,” Folger notes.
Moser, too, had virtually no prior experience on the track. “The last time I raced here was three years ago, on completely different tires,” he recalls. The heat also took its toll on the Yamaha YZF-R1M rider. “On Friday, it was so hot that I could barely get a feel for the bike. So we lost the day. On Saturday, everything was fine.” Seventh place in the first race was acceptable for the 27-year-old. Tenth place in the second race was not to his liking at all. “There was a huge oil slick on the track that I didn’t trust at the start,” he explains his initial caution. “In general, though, I took fewer risks than I do in the IDM anyway, since I didn’t want to get injured. The fact is, we definitely took the bike another step forward.”