Voltcom Crescent Suzuki racer Alex Lowes put on a superb display of determination to finish fourth in the eni FIM Superbike World Championship’s race two at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve. A similar determination delivered Lowes 10 points and a sixth place finish in the day's opening dry race.

Eugene Laverty leaves Portugal eighth in the championship after finishing eighth and ninth in yesterday afternoon’s two races. A disappointing conclusion to his impressive weekend showing, the Irishman looked to be bringing home a top six finish on his Suzuki GSX-R in the midday contest, before the tangle with the backmarkers on the final stretch of the last lap cost him two positions.

Alex Lowes: “After crashing yesterday in qualifying and being on the fourth row I'm quite happy with two solid top six results. In the second race if I hadn’t made a little error I could have been on for a podium but I’m happy to come from where I started and to get fourth. We learnt some more about the GSX-R today - we now know where we still need to improve and also have some proof on where it is working well - which can help us to keep moving forward. I really want to say thanks to the whole team, they were in the garage until 1:30am last night fixing the bike after my crash yesterday; it would have been really nice to reward them with a podium so I’m sorry about that, but I’m now looking forward to next week. I can’t wait for Laguna, it’s another new track, but it’s tight and twisty so it should suit us well.”

Eugene Laverty: “We were top four in every session apart from the three that mattered, Superpole and the two races! I’m very disappointed with race one, it was drizzling with rain and I was too scared to take risks and ended up in a low position. I lost two places on the last lap due to backmarkers but whether it was sixth or eighth, for me it wasn’t a good race. In the second race I didn’t have any feeling at all in the beginning, it came better in the end but it was too little, too late, so it was a poor day. We really had pace for the podium here so to walk away with an eighth and a ninth is not what we hoped for.”