Superbike, Honda bounces back with Jake Dixon: Estoril and Jerez are the real tests

During Ducati’s SBK celebration weekend, Honda also performed well with Dixon: the podium is still distant, but we are seeing progress that will need to be confirmed at Estoril and Jerez.

At the Cremona Circuit round, Iker Lecuona stole the show with three wins and Nicolò Bulega by clinching the Superbike world title, but there’s someone else with reasons to be pleased. For example, Jake Dixon of the Honda HRC team. After a poor Superpole that left him starting from 18th on the grid, the British rider brought the CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP to ninth place in Race 1 and in the Superpole Race, then starting from the third row he managed to finish sixth in Race 2. He wrapped up the weekend in Italy with Honda’s best result of 2026, definitely a confidence boost for the future.

It must be said that at the Cremona Circuit the CBR had also shown decent competitiveness in 2024 and 2025 with Vierge and Lecuona, so it might be a track whose characteristics suit the bike. Precisely for this reason, the upcoming rounds at Estoril and Jerez will be crucial to understand whether there has truly been a step forward or if it was merely a one-off “exploit.”

Dixon can only be happy with his performances and results at the Italian round: “Overtaking on this track wasn’t easy,” he told the official WorldSBK website, “but the team gave me a great bike for the weekend. They worked hard to make me feel better and step by step we improved with the tests we did. I was also lucky, because some riders crashed, but I still took some good results. Sixth place is like a win and we should be proud of it. Before Estoril there will be a test with Jonathan Rea and I know they are working hard in Japan as well. I hope we’ll have some updates for the next races.”

At the next round in Estoril, the Honda HRC team will arrive having already tested there in recent weeks. Even if conditions might be a bit different, the data collected should still help the riders.

While Dixon brought positive results to the Honda HRC team, on the other side there’s Somkiat Chantra who continues to struggle with the CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP. The Thai rider disappointed even on a favorable track like Cremona: he finished thirteenth in all three races over the weekend, also aided by a few crashes ahead.

We’ll see whether his passport will count more than his performances and allow him to keep his seat in 2027, or if Honda will give the bike to a rider with higher potential to try to achieve a real breakthrough in the Superbike World Championship. Meanwhile, Chantra will fly to Motegi to replace the injured Joan Mir in the HRC MotoGP team for this weekend’s Japanese Grand Prix.

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