SBK Aragon: Bulega crushes the opposition and the spectacle; Race 1 a no-contest

One day or another, Nicolò Bulega won’t win. But who knows how long it will take, because his superiority doesn’t waver—in fact, it seems to grow. At MotorLand Aragón, the fantastic Ducati rider reeled off his twentieth consecutive victory: all of this year’s, plus the final four of last season. Rivals, uncertainty, and spectacle: Bulega is pulverizing everything.

Making this modern-era Superbike picture even more surreal is the manner of it. Bulega is a thoroughbred rider, which means he doesn’t put a foot wrong. In Superpole he smashed the record—which already belonged to him—becoming the only rider to dip under the 1'47" barrier. Then, as always, he launched brilliantly, steadily pulling away from the only one who can hope to break the spell. But even riding the exact same factory Ducati, Iker Lecuona never lays a glove on him: it’s thirteen races in a row that he’s finished second, at varying distances.

Lecuona can only hope something unusual happens, but Bulega has everything under control. Not even on the very rare occasions when something unexpected occurred—like the sudden drizzle at Assen—did the dictator tremble. In the finale Lecuona closed in a hair, trimming the gap to about a second. But only because Nicolò was managing everything with a jeweler’s scale: physical effort, mechanics, tires. Everything to perfection. He wins, always and no matter what, and that’s that for everyone else.

Nicolò Bulega is doing what he was born to do: go fast and win. Superbike’s problem is that behind him there’s a void. Lecuona loses, but limits the damage while the others drift in distant waters. Sam Lowes, who crashed twice in practice, lifted spirits in the Marc VDS box with another excellent third place. In the top seven there are the usual six Ducatis, with veteran Tommy Bridewell, former British champion, joining the familiar train of Lorenzo Baldassarri and Yari Montella. The only “non-Ducati” that somehow salvages something is Alex Lowes’ Bimota, fourth place but sixteen seconds adrift of the duo from another planet.

And the other contenders?

Vanished from the scene, as has sadly become customary. Despite regulatory handouts, Yamaha and Honda can’t even save face. BMW doesn’t really count here: after losing the phenomenon Toprak Razgatlioglu to MotoGP, they also have to do without the injured Miguel Oliveira and Danilo Petrucci. Every man for himself.

MotorLand Aragón will serve up a fiery Sunday, mainly due to the environmental conditions. Because out on track there’s only one leading man: will Nicolò Bulega keep alive the winning streak that has run uninterrupted since Estoril last October? At 11:00 in the morning there will be the Superpole Sprint over a ten-lap distance. The final showdown is brought forward to 14:00 (18 laps) to avoid overlapping with MotoGP.

Corsedimoto on Instagram subscribe here to our channel