Yamaha’s Alex Lowes would probably have preferred not to ride in race one at San Juan but with his third-place championship rivals all lining up, he felt there was no other choice.

Other than having Haslam, who he replaces at Kawasaki in 2020, close in on him for a while, it was a solo effort for the Derby rider. “I had a very lonely race so it was like a practice session for me – just riding around on my own line,” he told bikesportnews.com.

A couple of times I looked at my lap times and I had lost a second here, a second there, and I could not tip in to the corner. Not ideal. It is not very consistent, the track.”

His thoughts about the weekend so far were a mirror or many others. “The first thing is, it is a shame. It is a great track a great layout and fun to ride, but it is just a shame that we have this problem with the surface that is not giving us a nice, good consistent feeling.

“There is not much else to say, really, about the track. It has caught a few people out this weekend, without really having done anything wrong. Which is not really fair. They just wander a lilt bit off line or get pushed off line and there were some quite big crashes, which shouldn’t really be happening. I do not know what else to say about it.”

Lowes was cajoled into not riding, and then cajoled into riding, and could see most other’s points of view. “To be honest I understood why the guys didn’t want to ride, and I think we saw in the first corner on the first lap, even four or five of us going in there we were slipping and sliding.

It was not ideal conditions but we managed to manage it. It is tough. I am fighting for third in the championship and if people are racing, I have to race. I always want to race, that is the first thing. But if Michael and everyone else is riding I have to ride whatever the conditions are and try to beat him.

"There is an element of that, of course… me Toprak and Michael are very tight in the points now. One bad race and you are fifth or worse. It wasn’t fair really for me to be in that position. I agree with all angles but we got the race done it was a decent race at the front and everyone is OK – except Loris in practice.”

Lowes finished off by saying, “Honestly I just feel sorry for Superbike. Everyone is going to have an opinion on this or that, who does not want to ride, and I am not going to argue with anyone about the safety of the track.

“That is everyone’s individual opinion. But for Superbike it just does not look good. We have some great racing and some great riders and we need to try and improve our image going forward compared to how it has been. That is the only thing that is a shame for me. But I am not disagreeing with anyone’s actions, really. I do not think it is fair, unless you are on the bike, when it comes to something like that to have a true opinion.”