Pure excitement at the Öhlins IDM race at the Nürburgring: In the Superbike Pre-Pole Practice, the twelve fastest riders qualified directly for Superpole 2, where the final starting grid for the two IDM Superbike races will be determined on Saturday.
At the front of the pack were BMW teammates Hannes Soomer (Masteroil Alpha Van Zon BMW) and Jan-Ole Jähnig (GERT56 by RS Speedbikes). The Estonian clocked a best lap time of 1:24.376 minutes. So Lukas Tulovic (Triple M Racing Ducati Frankfurt) didn’t let it get to him. The 25-year-old from Baden-Württemberg briefly appeared at the top on his red Ducati before slipping to third place. The championship leader had already set the fastest lap of the weekend so far in the second free practice session with a time of 1:24.292 minutes.
Tulo’s weekend had gotten off to a flying start anyway. On Wednesday, the 25-year-old treated himself to the Nordschleife experience. In a rented BMW, he completed three laps of the 20.832-kilometer-long Green Hell. His Supersport Dirk Geiger and Marcel Brenner each experienced the whole thing as passengers. “That was an amazing experience and a fantastic start to the weekend. I was happy to arrive three hours early for that,” Tulovic raved. However, he laughed off the idea of switching to auto racing: in his private life, he continues to rely on his Ford Transit—complete with space for his motorcycle.
The level of competition in the IDM Superbike class is impressive: all twelve riders who qualified directly for Superpole 2 are separated by less than a second. Leandro “Tati” Mercado (Masteroil Alpha Van Zon) was one of eight riders who took to the track for the first free practice session as a precaution, even though it had rained heavily all night and the temperature had climbed to just 13 degrees.
Florian Alt (Holzhauer Racing Promotion) was the first to take to the track under these conditions. As the only Honda rider in the field, he had no other choice, since the Nürburgring event has been a tough one for him so far. He finished eleventh in the Superpole Pre-Practice. “We have to see if we can catch up. I did at least ten more laps than everyone else during private practice yesterday before the event. Well,” the 29-year-old hopes, “maybe we’ll get lucky and it’ll rain on Sunday.” According to the forecast, it’s supposed to be sunny, but the infamous Eifel weather is notoriously unpredictable.
In the title race, Alt currently trails leader Lukas Tulovic by 15 points. With 100 points still up for grabs before the end of the season, everything is still up in the air in the battle for the IDM Superbike crown.
Superpole Pre-Practice Results:
Hannes SOOMER (BMW), Jan-Ole JÄHNIG (BMW), Lukas TULOVIC (Ducati), Leandro MERCADO (BMW), Kevin ORGIS (BMW), Bálint KOVÁCS (BMW), Toni FINSTERBUSCH (BMW), Twan SMITS (Yamaha), Lorenzo ZANETTI (Ducati), Soma GÖRBE (BMW), Florian ALT (Honda), Leon ORGIS (BMW).
Among the riders are Maximilian KOFLER (Yamaha), Isaac VINALES MARES (Kawasaki), Max SCHMIDT (BMW), Marco FETZ (BMW), Jan MOHR (Yamaha), Milan MERCKELBAGH (Honda), Christoph BEINLICH (BMW), and Sandro WAGNER (BMW) will compete tomorrow in Superpole 1 to determine the top three. They will then race in Superpole 2 alongside the riders who have already qualified to secure their final starting positions in the first five rows.