Elf MarcVDS Moto2 title favourite Sam Lowes has completed his first test of 2021, spending two days at Valencia trying many and varied parts and settings.

An 85-lap stint on day one saw Lowes quickly find the speed and confidence that helped him put up a strong fight for last year’s Moto2 title scrap and drew positive conclusions from a variety of geometry, suspension and throttle modifications, even though his setup changes every exit.

“It’s been a very good test because coming here the forecast wasn’t great but thankfully it stayed dry and that meant we could do a lot of laps and test many things,” said Lowes.

“It feels good to almost have my first proper test with the team because I missed so much of the pre-season last year with the shoulder injury. We didn’t look for a lap time because my focus was working on the bike and doing jobs that now we won’t have to do during a race weekend.

“It’s been very positive but like always in testing you discover things that don’t always work so well. But that’s also positive because it means it’s not something to try again.

“My rhythm was fast even though we made so many changes I didn’t really go out with the same bike for two runs in a row. We move to Jerez now and half the job will be checking the things I liked here to see if they work on a different track.

“There should be more grip there and that’s really good because it means we can try things in a range of different conditions to confirm what works best for me and give us a good direction to go to Qatar with.”