Bulega imposes its rhythm and bends to Toprak, with Baptist 3rd

Nicolò Bulega fulfilled his goal of starting winning at home, in Cremona. After his two falls in the Netherlands, the Italian reached his local round with the imperative need to return to the path of victory, and so it was. Leaving from the pole, the transalpine won the race 1 this Saturday, despite the thrust of Toprak Razgatlioglu. The current champion passed to his rival in the first round, and defended the position in the following turns, but in the fifth, Ducati imposed his best rhythm and the power of the Panigale to go to command the race and leave for the victory. The difference in the general between them is 26 points. Álvaro Bautista ended third, far from the head but with enough distance on his pursuers.

The first race of the weekend, the Race 1, of long distance, was going to be disputed with some somewhat peculiar conditions on the Italian track: with good condition in terms of heat and with the sun shining in some places on the track, but with the sky somewhat cloudy in others, gray, and threatening some rain at times.

At the exit, Nicolò Bulega came out perfectly and maintained the first position, ahead of Toprak Razgatlioglu, Álvaro Bautista and Andrea Iannone, who took advantage of the bad start of Sam Lowes, who was second. Soon, Razgatlioglu hit the leader waiting to try to attack him as soon as possible, he knew that he had a worse career rhythm. And in fact, just before the end of the first round, the Turk threw the motorcycle inside Bulega in a precious maneuver and to the limit to be placed in the place of privilege. Behind, the first fall came from Andrea Locatelli, who was looking to overcome.

Toprak came to close the door to his persecutor in the following turns, this while both, with a fairly fast rhythm, had achieved a second and a half margin about Bautista, Iannone, Remy Gardner and Lowes. In the third turn, with a quick lap in 29.4, Bulega reached BMW’s in the final part of the circuit, but Toprak became strong in the final turn to keep the front.

Bulega repeated attempt to overtake in the fourth return of the 23 scheduled, but left long and the current champion kept first place, with another quick lap in 29.3. The Italian continued squeezing to try to find a way to advance to Toprak, something he got in the fifth turn, overcoming him before the finish line. Razgatlioglu tried to reverse the situation at the beginning of Tour 6, but the Ducati Panigale V4R remained in the race head.

From there, Bulega wanted to start his rhythm taking advantage of the clean air and the absence of rivals ahead, although Razgatlioglu was not for the work of giving up the handlebar of the M1000RR, marking the same times as the transalpine. However, upon reaching the Ecuador of the test, the #11 of the Aruba.it reached the second second advantage.

Behind, Bautista was 5 seconds from the two heads, and he really was in no one’s land, since he had the same mattress on the rear group, where Iannone, Iker Lecuona, Gardner, Xavi Vierge, Michael van Der Mark or Danilo Petrucci fought for the fourth position.

In fact, the emotion stayed in that squad, since there was no more action ahead. Bulega headed for a new triumph, the fifth of the 2025 season, while Toprak minimized damage, second to 2.8 seconds. Bautista ended third, to achieve one more podium at the house of Burgo Panigale.

In the duel for the chocolate medal, less than 10 laps disappeared from the Lecuona group, due to a fall. Four pilots stood out: Iannone, Gardner, Vierge and Van der Mark. Iannone was able to keep the P4 without problems, and Vierge exceeded Gardner to look fifth. In the hand in hand for the seventh place, Danilo Petrucci reached the second of the BMW and managed to end in front of Van der Mark.

After the Dutch, Axel Bassani, Scott Redding, Alex Lowes, Sam Lowes, Dominique Aegerter, Yari Montella and Garrett Gerloff were left. On his return to the competition after the injury in Australia, Jonathan Rea ended 19, penultimate, 54 seconds from the head.

WSBK 2025 career results in Cremona