Bennetts British Superbike series leader Glenn Irwin believes all the pressure is on the Ducati riders at this weekend's Oulton Park round as it was been the Panigale V4R's best track last year.

Josh Brookes, Tommy Bridewell and Scott Redding won all five races at the Cheshire circuit with Brookes victorious in three-fifths of them, so Irwin says the pressure is on the Bologna bikes to repeat the feat - but he also isn't ruling out the Yamahas or Kyle Ryde's Buildbase Suzuki after he took his maiden win at Silverstone and then doubled it.

“I consider Silverstone to be a bit unique in the way that some bikes and riders were a set above, but I don’t feel that they won’t feature again at Oulton Park,” said Irwin.

“I expect Yamaha to be competitive and I have seen enough of Kyle over the first three events that he will be competitive, but I think that Oulton Park is probably Ducati’s strongest circuit, or one of them.

“It is one that Josh has gone well historically at, its Christian’s local and he goes well at it, Tommy has a good track record there, so for sure the pressure will be on them to maximise what I think is a round where Ducati will score really highly across the board.

“For us, I can’t change what they do – I wish I could. But we can focus on ourselves and making the best out of what the Fireblade, which I feel like we have done at every round so far. We have some new parts as well to test, which is always exciting, so we have a bit of development to do throughout free practice.

“If I go and I concentrate on myself and keep this cool, calm attitude, and work closely with the team, the pressure is on the Ducati boys and I am excited to see what they can achieve, but I am also excited to see what we can achieve as well.”